Radiotherapy, that is, radiation therapy, many people have a stereotype that when they mention these words, the first reaction is “harmful” – “So much radiation on the body kills tumor cells, and also treats good and normal cells. The cells are killed.”
Mr. Liu, who has entered middle age, suffers from advanced intracranial lymphoma. Mr. Liu’s family came to the Radiotherapy Department of Beijing Tsinghua Chang Gung Hospital affiliated to Tsinghua University for treatment. The patient lying on the stretcher has developed symptoms such as confusion, loss of autonomous mobility, incontinence and other symptoms, and the situation is not optimistic. After evaluation, the director of the department, Li Gong, took the “radiotherapy + immune” treatment for the patient, that is, the latest immune drug combination therapy was used at the same time as the radiotherapy. After several courses of treatment, Mr. Liu not only regained his ability to move independently, but also through imaging examination, the lymphoma in the patient’s brain has disappeared, reaching the standard of rehabilitation.
According to Li Gong, many patients and their families have a lot of misunderstandings about radiotherapy, which is caused by the limitations of traditional radiotherapy techniques. In the past, the radiotherapy technology had a large radiation range to the diseased organs, which inevitably caused “accidental injury” to other normal organs and tissues, causing unnecessary damage to the patients. This is also the reason why some people are more resistant to radiotherapy.
The current radiotherapy technology has made great progress. The combination of “radiotherapy + immunity” is often used, and the radiotherapy adopts the method of “precise strike, fixed-point removal”, and only the patient’s part is precisely irradiated. . At the same time, through the use of immune drugs to mobilize the autoimmune to attack the tumor, so as to achieve a better therapeutic effect. Not only the time of bed rest is reduced, the damage is greatly reduced, and the side effects are less. For patients with advanced tumors who are unable or unwilling to undergo surgery, as well as those whose physical conditions do not allow surgery, such as the elderly and frail patients, radiotherapy should be an option that can be considered.
For patients who have undergone radiation therapy, after the treatment, they need to pay more attention to rest and try to avoid fatigue; at the same time, observe the changes in the irradiation site, and conduct blood tests to check whether there is any injury such as inflammation; all After radiotherapy, strict and regular review should be performed to avoid missing the best treatment time due to symptoms such as recurrence.