Radiosurgery, Radiosurgery

Radiosurgery costs less than conventional surgery, and with much less morbidity, e.g. mortality, pain and post-surgical complications, such as hemorrhage and infection. The period of recovery is minimal, and in the day following the treatment the patient may return to his or her normal life style, without any discomfort. However, radiosurgery is not without limitations and disadvantges. It is difficult and dangerous to treat masses larger than 3cm because it will require very high doses of radiation. Fracationated radiotherapy may be a better option ideally combined with surgical debulking. The duration of time required to achieve the desired effects is much longer than surgery; it can take upto 2 years for arteriovenous malformations. During that time, the patient remains at risk for a rebleed. For treatment of tumors, it is important to remember than radiosurgery does not physically remove the tumor, rather stops it from growing larger. Therefore, it is not a good option when the tumor presents with significant mass effect on vital structures of the brain or spinal cord and when it causes increased intracranial apressure. Open surgery is needed to relieve pressure, remove the tumor totally or debulk (reduce it in size) it to make it a better target for radiotherapy or radiosurgery. Open surgery and radiosurgery are often used in conjunction for many types of brain tumors. Radiosurgery is a particularly good option for patients who are poor surgical risks due to their medical co-morbidities.

General indications for Radiosurgery include many kinds of brain tumors, such as acoustic neuromas, germinomas, meningiomas, metastases , trigeminal neuralgia, arteriovenous malformations and skull base tumors among others. Expansion of stereotactic radiotherapy to extracranial lesions is increasing, and includes metastases, liver cancer, lung cancer, pancreatic cancer, etc.

Source: Wikipedia > Radiosurgery