Breast cancer Respiratory radiation therapy reduces cardiac risk

Patients often had an infarct by radiotherapy
Scientists have long been aware that the currently used standard radiotherapy for breast cancer usually damages the heart. The general risk of getting heart disease after radiotherapy is very high. However, a new form of therapy gives hope. The burdens should be much more differentiated and thus harmless for the heart. However, only two clinics in Germany are using the new method.

Radiation treatment essential ingredient in cancer therapies
Radiation therapies are nowadays part of the treatment process for many types of cancer - usually in combination with other medical measures, e.g. Surgery, chemotherapy and hormone therapy. The aim of the irradiation is to damage the cancer cells by ionizing radiation - such as X-rays - so far for each type of cancer that they can no longer spread or be destroyed. But radiotherapy is usually very damaging to the heart, which is why the long-term consequences for patients are often very significant.

Differentiated radiotherapy relieves the heart by distance while breathing. Picture: Karelnoppe - Fotolia

Christine G. (46) reports: "In the beginning, the cancer diagnosis blew me away. After the therapy the cancer could be defeated quite well. But radiotherapy has damaged my heart very much. I still have heart problems today ". A few years ago, the novel radiotherapy for breast cancer was not offered.

Study showed extent of heart damage
A study by the University of Oxford in 2013, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, found that radiotherapy for breast cancer leads disproportionately to heart disease. The report said: "The more frequently a patient was exposed to a radiation dose, the more the heart was damaged at the same time." According to the study, "every year thousands of breast cancer patients die not from breast cancer, but from the long-term effects of radiotherapy" , A new therapy, which is controlled by breath, should now minimize the risk of heart disease.

The respiratory control controls the radiation treatment
There are already two clinics in the Federal Republic of Germany that offer breast cancer patients the opportunity to participate in the treatment themselves. "With the help of a monitor, patients can observe their own breathing," it says. In turn, the doctors can be instructed. So then the radiation device can only irradiate small but targeted breast areas. If the distance is high enough by the patient's inhalation, the device may begin irradiation. "In the meantime, it is possible to precisely adapt the treatment beam to the size, shape and position of the tumor so that surrounding healthy tissue is largely spared. The quality of treatment has improved considerably. Today, tumors can be irradiated as precisely as never before, "explains Prof. Dr. med. Carsten Bokemeyer, who heads the University Cancer Center Hamburg at UKE. For this purpose, the breast cancer patients have to breathe deeply, so that the heart lowers in the chest and the rays do not hit the heart tissue. Thus, the heart can be spared and the patients do not have to go through another serious illness.

In addition to the UKE in Hamburg, the Medical Care Center of Helios Klinikum in Berlin is the second hospital in Germany to give breast cancer patients the opportunity to monitor their own breathing using a small monitor in the treatment room. (Sb)