Radiation therapy

Radiation therapy is used to treat cancer. It aims to shrink tumors and kill cancerous cells. Radiation is a type of energy release in waves or particles. The energy releases in the form of X-rays, electrons, gamma rays, or protons.

Need

Radiotherapy is more useful in cancers that are sensitive to the therapy. It is a targeted therapy and is used to kill cancer cells existing even after surgery.
Duration
The radiation treatment is spread out over time to avoid the adverse effects of radiation.
Sometimes, treatment lasts for a week and is given twice in a day. Otherwise, radiotherapy is five day treatment in a week that lasts up to seven weeks. The treatment will take just 30 minutes from your entire day.
Preparation for the test
Consult the doctor before therapy
Though your doctor is recommending radiotherapy to you, you should clear following things before undergoing treatment.

• Necessity of treatment for you
• If it is in combination with surgery?
• Its chances of success
• Other options
• Preparation
• Details of treatment
• Side effects
• Risk of health problems in future

No special preparation is required for the radiotherapy. You have to go to the hospital. Radiotherapy is carried out in a special room designed for treating cancerous patients.

Procedure

Cancer cells divide more quickly than normal cells. Radiation therapy kills or damages cancerous cells. It breaks the strand of DNA molecule in cancerous cells. As a result, cancerous cells cannot grow and divide further. However, some normal cells may also be affected by radiation.
The radioactive elements used for therapy are

• Iodine
• Cesium
• Phosphorus
• Cobalt
• Gold
• Iridium
• Palladium
• Yttrium

Radiation therapy is carried out in two ways:

• External radiation therapy The treatment is often used for head and neck, bladder, lung cancer, and Hodgkin disease etc. While treating cancer cells with radiotherapy, the doctor tries to keep your body away from the radiation.

Special machines are used for external radiation. A machine known as linear accelerator delivers radiation to affected area. It creates high energy radiation with the help of electric energy.
Internal radiation therapy
Sometimes, the doctor also places a radioactive substance in your body and internal radiation is achieved. A seed of radioactive substance is placed temporarily in the catheters, tiny tubes or a special balloon site, MammoSite and is implanted in infected area.
Internal radiation is also known as brachytherapy, intraoperative radiation, intraoperative radiation intracavitary radiation, and low- or high-dose rate radiation.

Result

During radiation therapy, the doctor protects normal cells with limited radiation dosage, although the protection is only up to some extent. Combination of radiotherapy with chemotherapy or surgery, results in removal of a cancer.

Consideration

Side effects

• Skin pain
• Shedding of the outer layer of skin (desquamation)
• Death of skin tissue (atrophy)
• Hair loss
• Itching
• Increased skin coloring (hyperpigmentation)
• Fatigue and malaise
• Difficulty or pain swallowing
• Erythema
• Red, burning skin
• Changes in taste
• Low blood counts
• Nausea
• Edema
• Increased susceptibility to infection
• Fetal damage (in a pregnant woman)
• Vomiting
• Anorexia

Most of the side effects are temporary.
Greater recovery is achieved from radiotherapy. It works on specific body parts and hence there is little possibility of damage in other parts of the body. But, radiation therapy is expensive. The expenses would depend on the type of cancer and the number of treatments you need.