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Image-Guided Radiosurgery |
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Varian Medical Systems
and BrainLAB to Showcase Novalis Tx(TM) Platform for
Non-Invasive Image-Guided Radiosurgery
Varian Medical Systems
January 26, 2009
Powerful Technology for the Non-Invasive Treatment of Cancer
on Display at the 45th Annual Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS)
Meeting in San Francisco January 25-27, 2009
Palo Alto, CA -- A new non-invasive surgical device for
eradicating inoperable lung cancer and other conditions is being
showcased this week at the 45th Annual Society of Thoracic
Surgeons (STS) Meeting in San Francisco. The Novalis Tx(TM)
platform from Varian Medical Systems (NYSE: VAR) and BrainLAB
enables doctors to perform image-guided radiosurgery on tumors
of the lung, as well as of the brain, spine, liver, and
prostate, without making a single incision. |
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Novalis Tx performs
stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT), a form of non-invasive
radiosurgery that uses precisely-shaped and targeted radiation
beams to treat tumors and non-malignant growths from outside the
body.
"Novalis
Tx is a versatile device for performing fast, noninvasive,
image-guided radiosurgery," says Naren Ramakrishna, MD, PhD,
with Dana Farber/Brigham and Women's Cancer Center in Boston.
Early studies comparing SBRT with conventional radiotherapy -
the treatment that is most often prescribed for patients with
inoperable lung tumors - suggest that SBRT can result in a
better survival rate. Only 10-30 percent of inoperable lung
cancer patients who receive conventional radiotherapy survive
for five years. While five-year data is not yet available for
SBRT, the survival rate at three years has ranged from 54 to 91
percent. These results have encouraged the Radiation Therapy
Oncology Group (RTOG), a multi-institutional, international
organization that coordinates clinical research in radiation
oncology, to sponsor a phase II trial of stereotactic body
radiosurgery for the treatment of early-stage lung cancer--both
operable and inoperable.
"Preliminary studies suggest that stereotactic body radiation
offers us a good chance of achieving 85 to 90 percent local
tumor control rates in the treatment of early-stage lung
cancer," says Martin Fuss, MD, director of the image-guided
radiation therapy program at the Oregon Health & Science
University (OHSU). Dr. Fuss began using Novalis Tx to perform
radiosurgery on patients with lung and other forms of cancer
last October.
About the Novalis Tx Platform
The Novalis Tx platform combines the most advanced technologies
available from Varian Medical Systems, the world's foremost
provider of medical devices and software for treating cancer,
and BrainLAB, a leader in software-driven medical technologies
for precise and non-invasive surgical procedures. It
incorporates a powerful linear accelerator, which rotates around
the patient to target surgical beams at tumors from virtually
any angle. A set of sophisticated image guidance and motion
management tools provide clinicians with detailed information
about the shape, size, and position of the targeted lesion,
guide patient set up and positioning, and monitor motion during
treatment.
For surgery on moving tumors in or near the lungs, the Novalis
Tx includes devices for fine beam shaping and synchronizing
treatment with the patient's breathing patterns.
"Using Novalis Tx, clinics can treat twice the number of
patients per day than with any other stereotactic radiosurgery
system on the market," says Dow Wilson, president of Varian's
Oncology Systems business. "The speed and versatility of this
technology make Novalis Tx the most cost-effective solution for
offering advanced radiosurgical treatments to lung cancer
patients and others who can benefit."
For more information on Novalis Tx, please visit
http://www.varian.com/us/oncology/radiosurgery/. The Society of
Thoracic Surgeons (STS) Meeting will take place through January
27 at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco.
ABOUT BRAINLAB
BrainLAB develops,
manufactures and markets software-driven medical technology that
enables procedures that are more precise, less invasive, and
also less expensive than traditional treatments. Among the core
products are image-guided systems that provide highly accurate
real-time information used for navigation during surgical
procedures. This utility has been further expanded to serve as a
computer terminal for physicians to more effectively access and
interpret diagnostic scans and other digital medical information
for better informed decisions. BrainLAB solutions allow
expansion from a single system to operating suites to digitally
integrated hospitals covering all subspecialties from
neurosurgery, orthopedics, ENT, CMF to spine & trauma and
oncology. With 3,000 systems installed in over 70 countries,
BrainLAB is a market leader in image-guided technology. The
privately held BrainLAB group, founded in 1989, is headquartered
in Munich, Germany, and today employs 1,000 people in 16 offices
across Europe, Asia, Australia, North and South America. For
more information, visit BrainLAB at http://www.brainlab.com/ .
ABOUT VARIAN MEDICAL SYSTEMS, INC.
Varian Medical Systems, Inc., of Palo Alto, California, is the
world's leading manufacturer of medical devices and software for
treating cancer and other medical conditions with radiotherapy,
radiosurgery, proton therapy, and brachytherapy. The company
supplies informatics software for managing comprehensive cancer
clinics, radiotherapy centers and medical oncology practices.
Varian is a premier supplier of tubes and digital detectors for
X-ray imaging in medical, scientific, and industrial
applications and also supplies X-ray imaging products for cargo
screening and industrial inspection. Varian Medical Systems
employs approximately 4,900 people who are located at
manufacturing sites in North America and Europe and in its 60
sales and support offices around the world. For more
information, visit http://www.varian.com/. |
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