Deployment of a brand new proton therapy technology
The birthplace of radiotherapy, Institut Curie remains a leading world center in this field. A new milestone has just been reached with the launch of the PBS technique at the Proton therapy center.
Institut Curie is one of the world pioneers in proton therapy. This equipment, installed on the Orsay site, treated its first patient in 1991 with this ultra-precise form of radiotherapy.
In March 2017, a new milestone was reached with the treatment of the first patient using the Pencil Beam Scanning (PBS) technique. This new technology scans the tumor with the proton beam and thus treats tumors with complex volumes. The type of tumors that can benefit from proton therapy will thus be extended, allowing more patients to be treated using this high-precision radiotherapy.
The Proton Therapy Center is a high-tech hub
Since it opened in 1991, the Proton therapy Center has been involved in developing systems and continues to add new techniques to assist patients: Positioning robots in treatment rooms, bespoke software for scheduling (TPS) and information (OIS), dedicated imaging systems, treatments under general anesthesia. The teams have acquired great expertise in the technical as well as medical field.
They can treat all patients, children and adults alike, who need this type of radiotherapy, with or without general anesthesia.
Along with Nice, Institut Curie is one of two institutions in France to have proton therapy equipment. In the coming years, with the upcoming opening of a center in Caen, the three centers should be able to cover the needs of all of France for complex tumors, for which there are few alternatives to proton therapy.
With the launch of PBS, Institut Curie aims to continue to broaden the indications of these treatments, to include repeat irradiation of tumor relapses after photon radiotherapy, certain ENT cancers, mediastinal tumors including Hodgkins lymphoma (particularly in young women), sarcomas in the retroperitoneum, inoperable lung cancer, digestive cancers (liver and pancreas) and some types of breast cancer. Proton therapy remains a real hope for those patients who currently have few options other than proton therapy.