Cancer treatment Disease patients Prostate cancer Osteosarcoma Lung cancer Pancreatic cancer Solid tumors rare disease patients medical top
What is Particle therapy?
Has the efficacy of carbon-ion therapy fully validated?
Carbon-ion therapy expensive price
Will two additional rotating devices be introduced from next year?
[Interview] Professor Geum Woong-seop, Department of Radiation Oncology, Yonsei Cancer Center
Introducing new medical technologies is as proactive as increasing the number of cancer patients. In particular, particle therapy, also known as 'the dream treatment,' has been proven globally over several decades, becoming a beacon of hope for patients.
Severance Hospital introduced a particle therapy machine from Japan last year, and it began operation for the first time in Korea in April. I met with Professor Geum Woong-seop from the Department of Radiation Oncology at Yonsei Cancer Hospital (Director of Information Service Center for Digital Health, Yonsei University Health System) to discuss particle therapy.
- What is Particle therapy?
Particle therapy, also known as carbon ion therapy, is a treatment method that accelerates carbon atoms to the speed of light to create an energy beam that precisely targets and destroys cancer cells with minimal side effects.
This is achieved by directing billions of carbon atoms per second through normal tissue, delivering energy exclusively to cancer cells based on coordinates set by 3D X-rays, and dissipating.
Who are the primary cancer patient groups undergoing particle therapy?
Approximately 150 patients have been treated, with a focus on prostate cancer patients, as prostate cancer aligns well with the fixed treatment room.
The treatment outcomes for prostate cancer patients who received particle therapy have been promising thus far.
In fact, after completing the entire course of treatment, magnetic resonance imaging revealed a significant reduction in cancer cells, and the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) level dropped to less than 0.01 ng/mL from 7.9 ng/mL.
Will two additional rotating devices be introduced from next year?
Particle therapy demonstrates remarkable treatment outcomes in osteosarcoma. Osteosarcoma, even with chemotherapy, sees a 50% incidence of lung metastasis, and radiation therapy often results in relapse within months, with a 5-year survival rate of just 20% if metastasized.
However, among 48 patients with vertebral osteosarcoma who underwent particle therapy, the 5-year survival rate reached 52%, more than double the conventional rate.
Moreover, it proves effective against challenging cancers like lung and pancreatic cancer.
However, it does not apply to all cancer types; particle therapy is reserved for solid tumors with fewer than three metastatic sites, excluding blood cancers like leukemia.
Please compare it to conventional radiation therapy.
Conventional radiation therapy or proton therapy typically requires an average of 30 sessions, whereas carbon-ion therapy can be completed in as few as 12 sessions. Moreover, the treatment lasts less than 2 minutes, making it particularly effective for elderly patients or those with weakened physical conditions.
Has the efficacy of carbon-ion therapy been fully validated?
Carbon-ion therapy has already been proven as an effective treatment method.
According to the National Institute of Quantum and Radiological Science and Technology (QST) in Japan, which holds the world's most extensive clinical data on carbon-ion therapy, the two-year local control rate (a key indicator to assess the effectiveness of carbon-ion therapy, representing the probability of no recurrence of cancer at the treatment site) for pancreatic cancer patients for whom surgery is not an option has improved up to 80% when combined with chemotherapy and carbon-ion therapy.
Carbon-ion therapy is widely known to be highly expensive.
The cost of carbon-ion therapy exceeds 50 million won, so extreme caution must be exercised when considering this option.
Although widely hailed as the 'dream therapy' in numerous reports and even labeled as the 'cancer killer' by prestigious scientific journals like Nature, the reality is that it applies only to a very selective group of patients.
Factors such as localized distribution of cancer, resistance to conventional chemotherapy, and other considerations complicate its suitability. Yonsei Cancer Hospital makes decisions regarding carbon-ion therapy after extensive consultations across various departments, including radiology, nuclear medicine, internal medicine, and surgery.
With the introduction of rotational carbon-ion therapy units next year, we aim to extend the benefits to a larger patient population.
