Four different cultures with the same challenge: cancer. A new solution in the field of radiation therapy helps experts in South Africa, the USA, Germany and Poland to fight cancer more successfully and systematically. As a type of Adaptive Radiation Therapy (ART), the MVision™ software supports Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT). IMRT, is a therapy method that allows a regulation of radiation dose that combats the tumor while sparing healthy and critical tissues around it. With the help of the MVision software, physicians can create a 3D image of the patient, which allows them to observe the patient “from the inside.” Thereby, the new megavoltage cone beam imaging package, MVision, enables even more precise patient positioning. The MVision users can agree about that.

“For us, this investment is another step into Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT), a method that soon will be impossible to avoid and which we, as a private practice feel obligated to use. Precise patient positioning is indispensable for IMRT,” explains Gerd Schenk, PhD, Senior Medical Physicist of a private practice in Passau, Germany. Patient position is important because of a peculiarity regarding the dosage: Although the dosis administration outside the target volume is considerably lower when using IMRT, healthy and critical tissues still play an important role when regulating the radiation dose. Schenk adds, “For this reason, the position of risk structures has to be determined precisely when using IMRT.”

Frank Daniels, Medical Physicist at Pretoria Medical Hospital in Pretoria, South Africa was convinced of MVision’s advantages only a few weeks after receiving the technology. “We treat a considerable number of patients everyday, but only have few medical personnel available. Therefore, we have to optimally use the available time while simultaneously further improving the treatment results. What we have seen from MVision already fives us hope that we will achieve this,” he reports. At the Helen F. Graham Cancer Center in Wilmington, DE, USA and at the Holycross Cancer Center in Kielce, Poland, the MVision software has also won recognition – partly thanks to its flexibility. Dr. Pawel Kukolowicz, Senior Medical Physicist in Kielce says, “We currently use MVision for all types of tumors.” His American colleague Dr. Christoph Koprowski, Chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology, adds, “Despite the time required for a precise determination of the current target volume, MVision has drastically improved our workflow and cut our work time in half.”