Palliative Radiotherapy for Mesothelioma
High-dose radiotherapy to the hemithorax caused significant toxicity to most patients with no improvement in survival.
Raleigh, NC (PRWEB) July 24, 2017
Mesothelioma experts in Melbourne, Australia say they cannot recommend high doses of radiotherapy for palliative care of mesothelioma, based on the findings of their new analysis. Surviving Mesothelioma has the full story. Click here to read it now.
From 2003 to 2013, routine care for pleural mesothelioma at Austin Health in Melbourne involved irradiating one side of the patient’s chest with 45 to 60 Gy of radiation. The hope was that it would help alleviate mesothelioma symptoms such as shortness of breath and chest pain.
But a new analysis of the practice published in the Journal of Medical Imaging and Radiation Oncology suggests that that level of radiation was causing too many side effects.
"High-dose radiotherapy to the hemithorax caused significant toxicity to most patients with no improvement in survival,” reports study author Farshad Foroudi, MD.
More than half of the mesothelioma patients treated this way at Austin Health developed severe radiation-related side effects.
“Radiotherapy for mesothelioma is a treatment approach that still being developed and refined,” says Alex Strauss, Managing Editor for Surviving Mesothelioma. “Analyses like this one are vital to help clinicians understand how to walk the fine line between effective management of life-limiting symptoms and life-threatening toxicity.”
To learn more about the use of radiotherapy in the palliative care of pleural mesothelioma, see High Dose Radiotherapy Not Recommended for Managing Mesothelioma Symptoms, now available on the Surviving Mesothelioma website.
Foroudi, F, et al, “High-dose palliative radiotherapy for malignant pleural mesothelioma”, July 20, 2017, Journal of Medical Imaging and Radiation Oncology, Epub ahead of print, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28727277
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