What EXACTLY do Radiation Therapists do?
When someone needs a picture of their bones, such as if they may suspect a bone fracture, the Rad. Therapist only take radioactive machines that see thru your body, and take a picture of your bones! No. they dont use needles, but start learning the names and locations for all the bones in the human body, also learn medical terminology for the different positions the Doctors are going to request these pictures for, example lumbar sacral spine is the Back u need to take X-ray s of. Get prepared u have a lot to learn!
What is Chemotherapy and Radiation?
What is Chemotherapy and Radiation? I need a good resource for Chemotherapy and Radiation. Also. What are the Pros and Cons to Chemotherapy and Radiation. Also how is Chemotherapy and Radiation used? How does it work? If someone could answer all of these questions that would be great! Thanks!
How long does radiation therapy take to work?
Radiation therapy takes around 10-15 minutes to produce the effects on victim's body. After radio therapy, it is common to have swelling of the tumors that might last from a few weeks to months. Though, it requires some time to recover the normal body cells.This is how radiation therapy works-The radiation therapy gives damage to the cancer tumor cells while the beam is turned on.When the last treatment for radiation therapy is scheduled, no radiation will remain in your body.Once the DNA is damaged, the tumor cells can no longer divide and this is why sometimes, the tumor shrinks.The damage to DNA can take a while to occur may be up to weeks. Due to this, the doctors wait for a few months for an MRI or CT scan.Most importantly, the time taken by the radio therapy to work depends on the radio sensitivity at which one’s body is treated.
What does radiation therapy feel like?
Radiation therapy is the targeted use of high-energy radiations to kill cancerous cells. The radiations used in the radiation therapy can come from different sources. It is come from a reliable and effective machine outside your body. And, the radioactive materials are injected into your blood stream and also, radiation is placed inside the body near to the tumor cells.The Oncologists prescribe different types of radiation therapy on the basis of type and size of the cancer, and even, the location of the cancer tumor. The radiation treatment damages healthy cells as well. The symptoms of radiation therapy varies from patients to patients. And, not all patients feel same after radiation therapy. The feelings for radiation therapy depends on the amount of dosage you are getting at the time of treatment.Most of the people feels the following feelings during and also, after the radiation therapy-FatigueEmotional distressSensitive skin at the site of radiation exposure
Can someone get cancer from radiation therapy?
Yes. As radiation therapy involves exposure of the patient to ionising radiation, there is a risk that this will cause cancer later on. However, the risk of cancer from radiation therapy, while non-zero, is relatively low (albeit higher than chance). To give you some idea, a recent study into the matter looked at 322 cancer patients who had recieved radiotherapy for head-and-neck cancer. Only 4 of them developed cancer in areas of the body that had received radiation. While that is higher than would ordinarily be expected in that number of people, it's not exactly panic stations. In almost all cases where radiotherapy is indicated, the risk of secondary cancer is fairly negligible compared to the risk of not treating the initial one.
How does radiation work?
Most of the naturally occuring stuff comes from unstable atoms. When the balance between protrons and neutrons is out of whack, the atom will fly apart. Depending on the atom, it will break apart in one of 3 ways, it will emit an electron (beta decay), part of the nucleus (alpha) or throw off an electromagnetic wave (gamma). Gamma also commonly comes from high energy particle hitting the atmosphere and shattering atoms. The interaction releases a shower of other particles some of which release gamma. It's nothing to worry about as we evolved under these conditions and our bodies are build to handle it.
What exactly happens in Radiation Therapy?
You basically lay on a table and computer guided beams of x-rays, electron beams or gamma rays are aimed at the area that contain the cancerous cells. There is no chemical involved with external beam radiation. Some get burns, yes, but I did not. I had brain cancer and my skin just looked brown for a few weeks after treatments were over. There is also internal radiation where it's placed directly into or near the area.
Which is more painful - chemotherapy or radiation therapy?
I am typing the answer on cell phone so I ll be brief... The treatment with both the modalities is quiet morbid but both work differently in our body.Firstly,, chemo is systemic therapy.. Meaning it is never specific but will act on any and every rapidly dividing cells in the body. So while it targets cancer cells which divide rapidly, it will also act on other normal tissues which also divide rapidly like blood cells, hair follicles etc, thus, leading to side effects all over the body like depressed blood counts and hair fall.. Of course, it also depends on the type of chemo regimen given. Due to this widespread loss of cells, there is cascading effect of inflammatory response causing pain, nausea and vomiting.. So chemo does make you feel miserable at times.As for radiotherapy, it is local treatment of cancer area.. So the effects are much more localised. Here you will find depending on the dose of RT, various localized side effects like skin reaction, mucositis, dryness of the radiated area and site specific acute and long term side effects.. For eg.. If lung is it radiated it may cause pneumonitis, if pelvis is irradiated, it may cause bladder, rectum and bowel toxicity. There is also a great deal of understanding of how RT causes systemic effects like nausea and vomiting.It would therefore, be safe to say that both modalities are painful, depending on a lot of medical factors and individual threshold.. So yes, both can be painful but when you are fighting a gruesome enemy, “some pain will be encounterd”.Please discuss the pros and cons with your treating Oncologist for better understanding of side effects profile depending on chemo regimen, site of radiation and pre existing comorbidities.Hope it helps!