Brachytherapy, also known as seed implantation or sealed source radiotherapy, is a type of radiation treatment for certain kinds of cancer. This type of therapy can be used to treat endometrial cancer and cervical cancer but is most commonly used to treat prostate cancer. Brachytherapy is an effective treatment alternative to surgical removal of the tumor or other radiotherapy. The Prostate Cancer Treatment guide reports that after 12 years, 77 percent to 93 percent of patients are free of biochemical recurrence.
Outpatient Procedure
Brachytherapy is usually performed as an outpatient procedure. This means that it does not require an overnight hospital stay. This is an advantage in both cost and recovery.
A brachytherapy procedure takes one to three hours to perform, according to the Mills-Penninsula Health Services. The patient can receive a general anesthesia, but most receive spinal anesthesia, which numbs the patient from the waist down. Using spinal anesthesia also provides advantages because it reduces the risks associated with general anesthesia, such as nausea, vomiting, confusion and heart problems.
The seeds are implanted through thin needles inserted into the skin. Because brachytherapy does not require an open incision, the risk for infection is reduced.
Precise Targeting
The goal of brachytherapy is to place the radioactive seeds in a precise location to target only the cancer cells. All types of radiation therapy, including brachytherapy, use high energy ionizing radiation to inhibit the division of the cancer cells. Radiation therapy, however, is not specific to only cancer cells. Radiation delivered through external beam radiation therapy, known as EBRT, is delivered from outside the body and affects all the healthy tissues from the point of entry to the tumor and surrounding areas.
Because brachytherapy enables the delivery of radiation directly to the cancer cells, higher doses of radiation can be administered for longer periods of time. This is an advantage because higher doses mean more cancer cells will be killed.
Low Incidence of Adverse Events
The side effects of radiation treatments occur because of damage to healthy cells. The ability of brachytherapy to more precisely target cancer cells means that less healthy tissues are damaged. The result is a lower incidence of serious adverse events.
In prostate cancer, for instance, one of the main concerns with external beam radiation treatments and surgery is the high incidence of incontinence, the inability to hold urine and impotence. Although patients might experience frequent urination during the initial weeks after the seed implantation, the incidence of long-term incontinence or impotence is much lower than for other treatments, according to the American Brachytherapy Society.
