Cyberknife for radiation resistant metastatic lungs from breast

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In this article cyberknife was found effective where regular radiation failed to regress metastatic lung tumours from breast cancer. This is said to be an unusual application of cyberknife.
Has any one successfully been treated the same way for lung lesions?
With what side effects?

Cyberknife A Sharp Weapon Against Cancer June 20, 2006



After two years of fighting breast cancer, Nancy Kaiserman faced a terrible truth: Her cancer had spread to her lungs.

Despite rounds of chemotherapy and radiation, the deadly cancer had moved into both lungs, upper and lower.

Traditional radiation therapy didn't seem to be effective, and it was draining Kaiserman's energy. That's when she was introduced to CyberKnife.

"I did all the chemos and another radiation and I still wasn't getting my tumor to die," says Kaiserman, a 51-year-old Loxahatchee resident, who was diagnosed with cancer at 45. "I was running out of options."

The CyberKnife machine is non-surgical, focusing on high doses of radiation to destroy a tumor or lesion within the body that might not have previously responded to radiation.

The procedure has been used for more than 30 years, and more than 200,000 patients have been treated worldwide. Kaiserman was first treated at the CyberKnife Center in Miami. But her follow-up treatment - because it looked like the cancer might be returning - was at The CyberKnife Center of Palm Beach, which opened in November in Palm Beach Gardens. So far, it has been used to treat 100 patients.

It's the third CyberKnife Center in Florida (www.cyberknifepalmbeach.com. There's also one in Naples.

Backers say it can reach areas of the body previously thought untreatable and is effective for spinal tumors, lung, heart and brain tumors.

Kaiserman, being treated for lung tumors, is pleased with the results of her treatment, so far.

"It changed my life," she says. "I had energy, felt normal, didn't look like I was dying. I started working in my yard and planting flowers. Before, life was controlled by the tiredness (of radiation treatments). I started feeling like before my cancer."

She underwent the second CyberKnife procedure in Palm Beach Gardens in April. She was treated in three sessions lasting about 60 minutes each.

"She had been through quite a bit of chemotherapy," says Dr. Anne Lewis, a radiation oncologist who works with CyberKnife.

"She'd gone through extensive long periods of chemotherapy. She had three sites of disease in the chest. The rationale was to treat these three sites and she'd be theoretically disease-free."

Although good candidates for CyberKnife are usually those who can't tolerate surgery - especially for lung cancer - Kaiserman had metastatic cancer which had spread from the breast.

"She had been on so many different chemos," Lewis said, "that her medical oncologist said 'try this.' We are aiming for quality of life, getting off of chemo for a while, so she'll feel a little better."

Kaiserman says the CyberKnife, unlike radiation, doesn't cause any skin burn and there's "no feeling of tiredness the same way. It changed my life completely. I'm not doing chemo all the time. And I didn't lose the hair."

She also thinks her breathing has improved since the treatments.

"Before, I felt like an asthma patient. I wheezed. I had no breath. If I walked, I started panting. I used to do exercises, but then it started getting harder and harder to do," she said. "That's how I knew it metastasized."

Lewis, the oncologist, said the treatment is a relief for many patients who have been through everything else.

"CyberKnife offers peace of mind. They've gone through a whole lot of chemo and surgery. It's such an easy treatment to deliver: no needles, no blood work, except for a small needle insertion into the tumor."

But both Lewis and Kaiserman know this can't be considered a cure.

"She's potentially in remission for a period of time, who knows for how long," Lewis says.

And Kaiserman, who has battled bravely and is enjoying relatively good health, says, "How long I'll live, I never know. It could come back in the brain, bones, the ovaries. Anywhere."

Medicare, most insurance covers treatment

The Medicare allowable rate for a procedure is $6,000 for one session, typical when treating a brain tumor.

Body treatments may require more than one session, and the Medicare allowable rate is about $12,000.

Most major carriers cover a CyberKnife procedure, because it is not considered experimental.

Many HMOs, PPOs, and other plans approve the procedure, if the member has out-of-network benefits, or when it is well-documented that the patient has no other treatment options.

The FDA approved CyberKnife treatments in 2001.

- Source: CyberKnifePalmBeach