Proton therapy for lung and thoracic tumors

When lung cancer is treated with conventional radiation, it is difficult to deliver a high enough radiation dose to control the cancer without also damaging the normal lungs, esophagus, heart and spinal cord.

Proton therapy can more effectively treat these tumors—particularly larger ones— while better protecting critical structures from radiation. As a result, protons can minimize side effects such as lung inflammation (pneumonitis) or scarring (fibrosis), difficulty swallowing, heart complications, hospitalizations, and other side effects that are commonly seen with conventional lung cancer treatment.

Lung and thoracic cancers we treat with proton radiation therapy include

• Non-small lung cancer
• Small cell lung cancer
• Malignant mesothelioma
• Thymomas and thymic carcinomas
• Cardiac tumors
• Thoracic sarcoma
• Recurrent thoracic cancers

Most proton centers use “volumetric” beams that deliver a fixed quantity of energy to the entire tumor. But the pencil beam scanning technology at the New York Proton Center delivers “intensity-modulated proton therapy,” or IMPT.

Widely considered the most advanced form of proton therapy, IMPT can target different parts of the tumor with different radiation dose levels based on the prescription and tumor’s exact location, while better protecting the surrounding normal tissues from irradiation. That’s particularly valuable when treating the most complicated tumors, those residing in the fissures of the head, neck and skull base.