【醫療科技】希望之光 The Rays of Hope
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by
GKCF
The Gamma Knife is the only radiosurgery system in the world which is entirely dedicated to the treatment of brain lesions. Invented by the Swedish Neurosurgeon Professor Lars Leksell in 1968.
His golden phrase “The tools used by the surgeon must be adapted to the task and where the human brain is concerned they cannot be too refined.” has indeed stood the test of time.
From a fully manual frame-based treatment with the B Model in the 1990s, the Gamma Knife has transformed to the fully automatic digital PERFEXION in 2007 and the ICON in 2016 with the Cone Beam CT system paving the way for a totally non-invasive mask-based treatment option.
The radiosurgery principle of Prof. Leksell incorporates 192 narrow beams of Cobalt 60 radiation which converge via a collimator to a centre point known as the “isocentre”. Each individual beam is weak and harmless to the brain cell, but when the 192 beams converge at the isocentre, a high dose of radiation is generated resulting in tumour cell death. The Gamma Knife utilizes a robotic couch to move the tumour to the isocentre.
The fixed isocentre of the Gamma Knife gives an accuracy of better than 0.3mm which is the industry gold standard. The relatively low power of the Cobalt 60 radiation source and the short distance between the collimator to the targeted tumour contribute to the smallest “radiation penumbra ”, which is the area surrounding the tumour affected by the radiation.
The brain is the most vital and delicate structure in one’s body. Within this 3 lb organ are the billions of nerve cells controlling our cognitive and higher mental functions together with most of our bodily functions.
Professor Leksell designed the Gamma Knife very much with this in mind – a fully dedicated radiosurgery system capable of delivering a very accurate and high dose of radiation to the tumour target with minimal radiation dose to the surrounding normal brain tissues.
The vision of the Gamma Knife Charitable Fund is to offer these Rays of Hope to patients with financial difficulties who may benefit from the treatment.
Written and copyrighted by Gamma Knife Charitable Fund
