We have at last found something that we are going to buy for the Oncology Centre with the money that you have all helped raise to date. It is called a ‘Phantom’ (very Star Wars) but what it will do in lay terms is to improve accuracy and delivery of radiation treatment by acting as an intelligent dummy, prior to treatment being given.  A more accurate explanation is listed below:

“Bristol Haematology and Oncology Centre recently upgraded a radiotherapy treatment machine to deliver a new, advanced technique known as Intensity Modulated Arc Therapy. This technique can treat virtually every size of tumour,  using thousands of separate radiation beams. Each beam is choreographed to switch on and off as the machine head sweeps gracefully around the patient. This has the advantage over the current method of shorter treatment times improving the patient experience.

It is important to check the radiotherapy plan before the first treatment for each patient. During this check, a piece of equipment called a 3D “phantom” is treated with radiotherapy instead of the real patient. Sophisticated software analyses the delivered dose to ensure it is accurate. Intensity Modulated Arc Therapy can then be delivered to the patient with confidence.”

STOP PRESS...

As a consequence of training that has been carried out on our Phantom machine, it is now thought that it can be additionally used to treat a form of lung cancer that was hitherto untreatable in the South West.  This is very exciting & we will keep you all posted......