St. Luke’s Global City at the forefront of cancer treatment
St. Luke’s Medical Center-Global City has acquired the TrueBeam system, an innovative system that enables a radically different approach to treating cancer with image-guided radiotherapy.
Created by Varian Medical Systems and distributed by Siemens Healthineers in the Philippines, the TrueBeam system was engineered from the ground up to deliver more powerful cancer treatments with pinpoint accuracy and precision.
It uniquely integrates new imaging and motion management technologies within a sophisticated new architecture that makes it possible to deliver treatments more quickly, while monitoring and compensating for tumor motion, opening the door to new possibilities for the treatment of cancers in the lung, breast, abdomen, head and neck, as well as other cancers that are treatable with radiotherapy.
“TrueBeam is a real game-changer that will enable us to treat even the most challenging cases with unprecedented speed and precision,” said Dr. Arturo S. De La Peña, president and CEO of St. Luke’s Medical Center. “TrueBeam makes it possible for us to offer faster, more targeted treatments to tumors even as they move and change over time.”
According to the Department of Health and Philippine Statistics Agency, cancer is one of the leading causes of mortality in the Philippines.
“At Siemens Healthineers, we are committed to empowering healthcare providers towards expanding precision medicine, transforming care delivery, and improving patient experience. We are happy to have aided in St. Luke’s Medical Center-Global City’s acquisition of the TrueBeam system which paves the way for innovative cancer treatment,” said Mike Tan, president, Siemens Healthineers Philippines.
The TrueBeam system can complete a treatment commensurately faster, making it possible to deliver accurate imageguided treatments in just a few minutes per day with dose delivery rates that are 40–140 percent higher than earlier generations of Varian technology. Simple treatments that once took 15 minutes or more can be completed in less than two once the patient is in position.
“These are significant reductions in treatment time,” said Dr. Juan Martin T. Magsanoc, Department of Radiation Oncology head of St. Luke’s Medical Center. “Patients will spend a whole lot less time lying still.”
The precision of the TrueBeam system is measured in increments of less than a millimeter. This accuracy is made possible by the system’s sophisticated architecture, which synchronizes imaging, patient positioning, motion management, beam shaping and dose delivery, performing accuracy checks every 10 milliseconds throughout the entire treatment.
For lung and other tumors subject to respiratory motion, TrueBeam offers gated RapidArc radiotherapy, which makes it possible to monitor patient breathing and compensate for tumor motion, while quickly delivering dose during a continuous rotation around the patient.
“Locally, lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related mortality for men and is the third cause of cancer deaths among women,” said Dr. Magsanoc. With TrueBeam, we can treat a moving lung tumor as if it were standing still.”
TrueBeam’s imager generates threedimensional images of the tumor 60-percent faster as compared with previous generations of Varian imaging technology. Additional functionality makes it possible to create images using 25 percent less X-ray dose.
“Imaging is an essential part of modernday, targeted radiotherapy,” explained Dr. Magsanoc. “This machine allows us to choose an imaging mode that minimizes the amount of X-rays needed to generate an image — and that’s good for our patients.”
TrueBeam can be used for radiotherapy treatments including image-guided radiotherapy and radiosurgery (IGRT and IGRS), intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT), RapidArc® radiotherapy and gated RapidArc.
“With TrueBeam, we can select the optimal treatment for every type of cancer,” said Dr. Magsanoc. “This is a breakthrough that lets us bring a wider spectrum of advanced radiotherapy treatment options to many more patients. It represents a quantum leap in our ability to help people fight cancer.”