Enter MVision™ software. The Siemens megavoltage cone beam imaging solution enables physicians to determine the location of the target tissue and to automatically correct the treatment field – right at the linear accelerator, all within approximately three minutes. “With MVision, we are investing in an important development, namely Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy. You have to be able to prepare yourself today for what will happen in the future, especially when you are in private practice. The expectations brought to medicine will change completely. We want to be actively involved in shaping the future of medicine and technology,” says Gerd Schenk, PhD, Senior Medical Physicist, when he explains why the privately-held Altötting Radiation Therapy Practice invested in the technology early on.

But patient care in Altötting goes well beyond sophisticated treatment and technology. The practice itself is quite a sight: a bright, light-flooded building with large, inviting windows, soothing walls painted in sunny yellow, and the treatment room equipped with colored lights. The physicians use the architecture as a dialogue board with their patients – instead of talking about the tumor, treatment, and side effects, they first talk about art and nature. “It helps them free part of their minds. The patients stop fixating on cancer. It uplifts their spirits,” says Bertram Rosskopf, Chief Radiation Oncologist and one of ten partners in a chain of radiological practices and radiation therapy centers in Southeastern Germany.