Radiation Oncology
Carle Clinic radiation oncologists use the most advanced radiation therapy technology available to reduce treatment side effects, spare healthy tissue and produce more positive outcomes for patients in the fight against cancer.
External beam radiation therapy is aimed only at a specific part of your body. Intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) provides precise external beam radiotherapy treatments. Instead of a single radiation beam, IMRT breaks the radiation into thousands of thin beams to better target the cancer and minimize harm to surrounding tissue.
Varian Linear Accelerators allow us to provide truly comprehensive image-guided radiation therapy (IGRT), one of the most cutting edge innovations in fighting cancer. IGRT combines imaging and treatment capabilities on a single machine.
Carle Cancer Center is among the first in central Illinois to offer TomoTherapy®, a single piece of equipment that allows radiation oncologists to both image the tumor and treat it with thousands of radiation beams directed in a 360˚ pattern.
Other treatments include:
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Stereotactic radiosurgery: uses a large dose of radiation to destroy brain tumor tissue, but does not involve actual surgery
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Stereotactic radiotherapy: delivers radiation to tissue, but uses multiple small fractions of radiation instead of one large dose
- 3D conformal radiation therapy: uses CT, MRI or PET technology to more precisely target tumors gauging width, height and depth; 4D conformal radiation therapy includes respiratory gating
- Intraoperative radiation therapy (IORT): delivers radiation to tumors while they are exposed during surgery; a single dose can have as much effect as 10 to 20 daily radiation treatments.
- Brachytherapy: delivered in the form of prostate seeds (permanent), radioactive implants and radioisotope therapy
Learn more about radiation oncology and how to choose the cancer center that's right for you by requesting our scorecard.