The Missouri Health Facilities Review Committee has approved St. John’s request to acquire a Cyberknife. The Cyberknife is a radiosurgery device that allows precision radiation treatment for tumors anywhere in the body, especially in difficult-to-treat areas near the brain and spine.

“The Cyberknife allows for true radiosurgery,” says Alan Scarrow, M.D., J.D., chairman of St. John’s Neurosurgery. “We use the word surgery because we’re able to treat these tumors with a one-time, high dose, highly accurate and focused radiation.”

Traditional radiation treatment usually consists of five treatments a week for up to six weeks, according to Scarrow. Lower doses of radiation over the course of weeks helps protect healthy tissues while the cancer cells are killed.

“With radiosurgery, we can deliver it one time. We can deliver high-dose, concentrated radiation in one area and leave the rest of the brain alone,” Scarrow says. “This is more convenient and safer for the patient, as well as being highly effective.”

St. John’s Radiation Oncology department expects to treat approximately100 patients with the Cyberknife each year and will begin using the new technology in early 2005. Previously,
St. John’s newest cancer treatment technology was intensity modulated radiation therapy, which works in conjunction with CT scans to produce a three-dimensional view of the tumor and the patient’s anatomy, allowing the radiation to be focused, sparing healthy tissue. The Cyberknife allows for even more focused radiation treatment than IMRT.

St. John’s Radiation Oncology department treats 75 patients each day and in the next year, expects to administer approximately 18,000 treatments to 1,200 patients.