Radiosurgery: Methods and Limitations

Radiosurgery is a way of removing tumors from organs like the brain, lungs, liver, and pancreas without actually performing surgery on an individual. It relies on several low-dosage beams of radiation targeted at the tumor.

When the beams intersect at the cancerous cells, the force of the radiation basically destroys the DNA in the cells which causes the cell to break down. When this happens repeatedly to all the cells in the tumor, the tumor will eventually be destroyed. The rays damage the immediate surroundings as well. This damage creates free radicals, unstable charged particles that create a microenvironment that is impossible for cells to survive in.

Once these cells are destroyed, the immune system takes over. Dendritic cells are like the janitors of the immune system, and they clean up the remains of the cancerous cells. Other immune cells like T-cells and endothelial cells form scar tissue. Scar tissue is part of the body’s natural healing process, and helps the nerve reattach to nearby structures. All major bodily injuries, like spraining an ankle or a brain tumor, will result in scar tissue as the body heals itself.

The limitations of radiosurgery include that it is normally only used on smaller tumors. This is likely because the likelihood that the radiosurgery misses some cancerous cells is lower with smaller tumors. If cancer treatment, radiosurgery or traditional treatment methods, leave cancerous cells behind, the probability of recurrence is very high. Another limitation of radiosurgery is that radiation has a cumulative effect. Essentially, when a patient goes for radiosurgery, the radiation is still in their system. This makes it dangerous for repeated treatment using radiation because it is difficult for doctors to gauge exactly how much radiation is still in someone’s system.