Record demand for Varian's RapidArc radiotherapy treatment
29 April 2008
Varian Medical Systems (NYSE: VAR) has announced it has received more
than 60 orders for its new RapidArc radiotherapy product for faster
image-guided intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT). RapidArc orders
have been concentrated in North America but have also come in from
Europe and Asia since the product was introduced to the market in
January, according to the company.
“We are delighted with the early interest in RapidArc, which promises
to be a formidable weapon in the battle against cancer,” says Tim
Guertin, president and CEO of Varian Medical Systems.
“This represents the strongest demand for any new product in our
history and reflects the need for faster, more user-friendly systems
that enable clinics to offer more patients greater access to advanced
image-guided IMRT treatments with precision and quality." The company
expects to begin shipment of the RapidArc product before the end of this
month.
RapidArc delivers a complete volumetric IMRT treatment in a single
arc of the treatment machine around the patient and makes it possible to
deliver advanced image-guided, intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT)
two to eight times faster than is possible with conventional IMRT,
including helical tomotherapy.
Treatment planning analyses show that RapidArc matches or exceeds the
precision of conventional IMRT systems and spares more of the healthy
tissue surrounding the tumour. Clinical studies on radiotherapy
correlate the ability to spare more healthy tissue with reduced
complications and better outcomes.
Todd Scarbrough, MD, medical director of the MIMA Cancer Center in
Melbourne, Florida, says, “The largest, most easily quantifiable gain
which RapidArc offers is an improvement in treatment time. There is no
other system on the market which can offer a standard (1.8-2.0 gray)
daily radiation dose, as an IMRT treatment, in a 2 minute timeframe.
Furthermore, with this dramatic improvement in treatment time, there is
no trade-off in any other area. If anything, there is an
improvement—although modest in many cases—in dose distribution, and also
less total scatter ‘out-of-field’ dose to the patient.”
Dr. Ben Slotman of VU Medical Center in Amsterdam supports this,
saying, “The benefits of fast RapidArc treatments are many — faster
treatment delivery has an economic benefit because more patients can be
treated with more advanced techniques at a lower cost to public
healthcare systems. In addition to improving patient comfort, shorter
treatment times can enhance treatment quality by reducing the risk of
patient movement during treatment. It is also clear that when a dose
distribution is more conformal to the tumour or enables better avoidance
of critical structures, a higher dose can be given, with better options
for treatment and lower risks of side effects.”
"In modern cancer treatments it’s important for treatment machines to
be versatile,” says Mohan Suntha, MD, of the University of Maryland
Department of Radiation Oncology. “Radiation oncologists need to be able
to deliver high quality arc therapy for prostate and head and neck
tumours, but you also need to deliver fixed beam treatments for breast
cancer in order to avoid unnecessary exposure of the heart and lung; you
need motion management for lung cancer treatments; and electron beam
treatments for lesions on or near the skin. To have a single machine
that offers all these treatments in a high quality fashion is the best
approach for our patients.”
Each year 10.9 million people worldwide are diagnosed with cancer and
there are 6.7 million deaths from the disease. The global number of new
cancer diagnoses is predicted to increase to 15 million per annum by
2020 and 20 million per annum by 2050. Radiotherapy is currently used in
up to 60% of all cancer treatments.