A8 — HERALD-CITIZEN/REGIONAL BUYERS GUIDE, Cookeville, Tenn. — www.herald-citizen.com — Wednesday, Janaury 29, 2014
MEDICAL DIRECTORY
Tomotherapy less invasive cancer treatment By LaUra mILITaNa
treatment.” Clay County’s Ray Norris can attest to the benefits of the tomotherapy machine. “I have been through cancer a couple of times before and this, by far, is the easiest treatment,” he said. He was diagnosed with prostate cancer in late 2008 and went through tomotherapy treatments for eight weeks. “It was done on my schedule,” he said. “I
HERALD-CITIZEN Staff
COOKEVILLE — Less side effects and more effective treatment. That’s what Dr. Jonas Sidrys, oncologist with Cookeville Regional Medical Center’s Cancer Center, says about the latest cancer treatment available at CRMC. “It’s like a CAT scan machine on steroids,” he explained of the tomotherapy system, which has been used at CRMC for the last five years. “I was immediately impressed with the decrease of side effects and the results that came from treatment,” Sidrys said. It’s a new type of radiation therapy that employs a technique called IMRT (intensity-modulated radiation therapy) and delivers thousands of beamlets of strength that converge on the target to control the dosage. It is best used to treat prostate cancer (intact prostates or on prostate bed), head and neck cancers (namely tonsil and throat cancers to protect the salivary glands), pancreatic cancers and certain brain cancers. “It depends on the location of the tumor that determines the treatment,” Sidrys ex-
had no side effects either.” In 1998, he was diagnosed and treated for skin cancer and 10 years later, was diagnosed and treated for colon cancer. “I went through 11 months of chemotherapy,” he recalled. “When the prostate cancer occurred, I knew I had enough surgery. I read about radiation treatment and decided See TomoTherapy, page 9
Barbar a J. Johns on Licens e d Clinical S o cial Worker a tomotherapy device.
plained. Each session takes around five minutes, five days a week for around seven weeks of treatment. CRMC is one of two hospitals in the state to have a tomotherapy machine. The other is in Knoxville. “I had one patient drive 4,875 miles for tomotherapy treatment,” Sidrys said. “It is ultraprecise and determines on the patient’s position each time for optimal
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