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IORT radiation therapy has been around for a longtime, but the resurgence in the interest
in intraoperative radiation therapy is the fact that we now have mobile linear accelerators
that can deliver very high doses of radiation therapy directly to where the cancer was at
the time of surgery in an operating room that is not a big fixed cement vault that we generally
need for a linear accelerator. IORT has been of big use and big boom in Europe and
is now coming to the United States. Here in my practice at St. Joseph Hospital we are
really lucky to have a mobile linear accelerator called the Mobetron. We have been using this
technology for the past three years to do the boost part of whole breast radiation therapy
starting the radiation therapy at the time of surgery so we can directly look right onto
the area where the cancer was, making sure the dose of the radiation therapy is being
properly delivered. We also have two protocols in addition here at St. Joseph Hospital where
we do the boost intraoperatively followed by a shortened hypofraction radiation therapy
or we now have a single fraction one time only radiation therapy in selected cases and
again that is done through a research protocol. So clearly IORT is cutting edge treatment
of breast cancer. I am very fortunate to have it available
for
my practice.