Had Gamma Knife

[HavahJ]

Has anyone else had it? What were your results?

[StephN]

Search for "Gamma Knife" or "stereotactic radiosurgery" in this site and you will find posts from all of us who have posted here about these treatments.

My results have basically been good with this procedure, but I am having some trouble with a side effect called "radiation necrosis" which can show confusing results (might be tumor) on follow-up MRIs.

Gamma Knife is a very painless and easy-on-the-patient procedure. Much easier than open surgery, which can also reusult in a necrosis condition that has to be excised.

Hope for the best and have the procedure, if this is what your rad onc feels is right.

[nouprjz]

My wife had gamma knife in April 2004. No problems.

[Joe]

Christine, the founder of this group had gamma knife twice 1999 & 2001..She has been NED since the summer of 2001.


Regards
Joe

[pattyz]

I've had five seperate focalized treatments similar to Gamma Knife: three Linear Accelerator, two CyberKnife.

These treated a total of 16 brain mets successfully over the span of 18 months. The only 'side effects' were the severe short-lived headache after removal of the headframe 3x's, and hair thinning to complete hair loss to areas radiated. Had total hair recovery. A bit of pressure to head was also treated successfully with VERY low dose of Decadron for just a week post treatments.

This is not to say that others have not experienced lasting or long term side effects after Gamma Knife. Some few do.

And finally, here is a report from 2001 that I have saved:

TORONTO, ON -- April 24, 2001 -- Stereotactic gamma knife radiosurgery to treat brain metastases may have adverse effects that leave the patient in need of further conventional surgery, researchers report.

It’s well known that radiation therapy can and does have adverse effects in many patients undergoing treatment for cancers.

Speaking here at the annual meeting of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons this week, Dr. Mark Liker, a neurosurgeon at University of California reviewed the records of almost 274 patients who underwent stereotactic gamma knife radiosurgery for brain cancer.

"We need to identify these adverse effects and other tumor characteristics that contribute to these untoward events," he said in a podium presentation.

The mean age of the patients in the study was 57 years, and they had a total of 700 metastatic lesions between them. They underwent a total of 391 (Stereotactic gamma knife radiosurgery (SGKR) sessions, or an average of 2.6 sessions per patient, to remove the tumors, which had a mean diameter of less than 3 cm. The mean radiation dose the patients received was 20 Gy.

As with the rest of the cancer population in southern California, there was a preponderance of melanomas (n=139) and non-small cell lung cancers (n=54) that had metastasized. The balance of tumors were made up of breast cancers and renal cancers.

Dr. Liker said patients in the study were stratified into two groups according to whether they needed further surgery, or whether they had acute reversible symptoms.

Adverse effects were not recorded immediately after SGKR. The mean time to onset for all conditions was 26.4 days. Fatigue, which occurred after 13.8 percent of the sessions, had an aveage onset of 32 days post-treatment. Headaches, which occurred after 12.1 per cent of the stereotactic sessions, had a time of onset of 19 days. Nausea and vomited occurred in fewer patients, but occurred an average of 12 days after treatment.

Other adverse effects that were recorded included dizziness, loss of balance, weakness, and seizures.

In all, complaints of adverse effects followed 39 percent of the sessions.

"The only significant factors that were identified that could perhaps separate out the patients who had symptoms were untreated volume and the tumor volume. These were significantly greater for the symptomatic population than for the overall population," Dr. Liker said.

There were 13 patients or 4.7 percent of the population who required further surgery and who had not responded to pharmacological intervention.

Interestingly, these patients did not report significant symptoms until much later than the others-34 weeks on average. One other common factor among those patients was that half of them had received prior whole-brain radiation therapy. Furthermore, six of the 13 had signs of necrosis, while five of the 13 had tumors with no necrosis.

"There is a high percentage of patients with symptoms after stereotactic gamma knife radiosurgery, and we think this is probably an underestimate of the actual value. The majority of reversible symptoms were identified within 100 days of initial surgery. And the symptoms both reversible and intractable correlated with the size of the lesion."

[Kim in CA]

I had Gamma Knife last August for a single lesion that was 11mm. So far, MRIs every 3 months show no trace of the tumor. I didn't have any side effects either, other than a little tenderness where they attached the framework to my head. Kim in CA

Hi, my mother had the Gamma Knife surgery in March and since September feels week and has had trouble hearing and with her vision. Is this related to the Gamma Knife? Has anyone heard of this? And are these symptoms permanent?