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Treatment options for prostate cancer

There have been many advances in the treatment of cancer in recent years and the radiation treatment of cancer is one of them. Specifically, proton radiation therapy is an even more refined and exacting form of radiation treatment for cancer.

Proton therapy for cancer is a specific, targeted type of radiation treatment for cancer that stops at the exact targeted tissue for treatment and does not spread to the surrounding areas of the targeted tissue. This is very important and has proven to be very beneficial in radiation treatment for cancer. For instance, with proton treatment of breast cancer, it has been found that 50 percent less radiation goes to the lung, and on average no radiation goes to the heart with proton cancer treatment, compared to convention radiation treatment for cancer.

Also, in the treatment of prostate cancer, a disease that affects many men, proton therapy for prostate cancer has proven to especially helpful. Through research, it has been determined that of men with a low risk of prostate cancer, 99 percent of them had no recurrence after five years of follow-up. With those of intermediate risk, there was a 74 percent showing of no recurrence, and even in the high risk group, 74 percent had no recurrence after the five year follow-up. Also, with this type of proton radiation treatment for prostate cancer, rather than conventional radiation treatment for cancer, impotency in men was largely avoided, with 94 percent of men remaining sexually active after proton therapy treatment.

So successful has this cancer proton therapy become in the radiation treatment for cancer that about 30 particle therapy centers, in the beginning of 2015, were being built around the world. Resulting in about 80 treatment rooms, this is an expansion. Interestingly enough, although a treatment session may take anywhere from 15 to 45 minutes, the protons are actually delivered to the tumor in only a minute or two. (Particle therapy centers use protons, a highly charged particle, in the delivery of this specific form of radiation treatment for cancer.)

Proton radiation therapy has also been found to be more beneficial than X-rays in some cases. For instance, it has been found that proton radiation reduces the radiation dose to the gastrointestinal structure by about 59 percent in contrast to X-rays.

An advancing form of radiation treatment for cancer, proton radiation therapy is gaining in usage.