What is the CyberKnife?
The CyberKnife Robotic Radiosurgery System is a non-invasive alternative to surgery for the treatment of both cancerous and non-cancerous tumors anywhere in the body, including the head, spine, lung, prostate, liver and pancreas. The treatment – which delivers beams of high dose radiation to tumors with extreme accuracy – offers new hope to patients worldwide.
Though its name may conjure images of scalpels and surgery, the CyberKnife treatment involves NO cutting. In fact, the CyberKnife System is the world’s first and only robotic radiosurgery system designed to treat tumors throughout the body non-invasively. It provides a pain-free, nonsurgical option for patients who have inoperable or surgically complex tumors, or who may be looking for an alternative to surgery.
What are the patient benefits of treatment with the CyberKnife?
Unlike open surgery and alternative treatments, the CyberKnife is primarily an outpatient procedure and takes approximately 30 to 90 minutes per treatment. Patients receive one to five treatments total.
Patient Benefits:
- Painless
- Sedation Free
- No incisions or blood loss
- No recovery time – patient can go home the same day
- Lower risk and fewer complications than open surgery
Additional Advantages:
- The radiation dose to organs at risk is minimal, even those that are immediately adjacent to the lesion
- Staged/fractionated radiosurgery for intracranial and head lesions is now possible with CyberKnife
- No head or body frame is required because patient movement is detected and compensated by adaptive beam pointing
- Since no head or body frames are required, CyberKnife treatments can be performed in one to five fractions. This enables the administration of an effective dose of radiation to a lesion while mitigating the injurious effects to critical structures/organs at risk
CyberKnife has revolutionized the patient’s quality of life:
- Instead of coming in for treatment every day for six to eight weeks, CyberKnife patients only have to come in for one to five days. This shorter treatment course is more convenient and less stressful for patients and their families.
- Since neither incisions nor general anesthesia is required in a CyberKnife procedure, the risk of complications, and therefore recovery time, is dramatically reduced or totally eliminated after a CyberKnife treatment. Patients can even return to work on the same day they had a treatment.
What can be treated by the CyberKnife?
The CyberKnife System is a non-invasive alternative to surgery for the treatment of both cancerous and non-cancerous tumors anywhere in the body including:
- Brain
- Head and Neck
- Spine
- Lung
- Liver
- Kidneys
- Pancreas
- Prostate
- Recurrent Tumors
Why is the CyberKnife system unique?
The CyberKnife System is a one-of-a-kind device for several reasons.
First, the CyberKnife System uses image-guidance software to track and continually adjust treatment for any patient or tumor movement. As a result, patients do not need to hold their breath during treatment and can just breathe normally and relax comfortably. This capability sets the CyberKnife System far ahead of other similar systems.
Second, some forms of radiosurgery require rigid head-frames that are screwed into the patient’s skull to minimize any movement. The CyberKnife System does not require such extreme procedures to keep patients in place, and instead relies on sophisticated tracking software, allowing for a much more comfortable and non-invasive treatment.
Third, unlike some radiosurgery systems, which can only treat tumors in the head, the CyberKnife System has unlimited reach to treat a broad range of tumors throughout the body, including the prostate, lung, brain, spine, liver, pancreas, and kidney.
Finally, the CyberKnife System’s treatment accuracy is unrivaled. Its ability to treat tumors with pin-point accuracy is unmatched by other radiation therapy and radiosurgery systems. The CyberKnife System can essentially “paint” the tumor with radiation allowing it to precisely deliver treatment to the tumor alone, sparing surrounding healthy tissue.
