Let’s Win posted an article discussing this major question:
Can a combination of precision radiation therapy and standard chemotherapy be an effective treatment for pancreatic cancer that has spread to the liver, in patients with specific mutations?
Precision medicine is no longer limited to targeted drug therapy; it has also been adopted in radiation therapy. In the past, radiation beams only matched the height and width of the tumor causing significant damage to the surround tissue. Advances in imaging technology have made it possible to locate and treat the tumor more precisely, sparing healthy tissue from radiation exposure.
For carriers of a genetic mutation that makes it harder for tumor cells to repair DNA breaks, researchers are looking at whether the combination of precision radiation and chemotherapy can help patients whose pancreatic cancer has metastasized to the liver.
What Is Conformal Radiation Therapy?
Conformal radiation therapy (CRT) shapes the radiation beams to closely fit the area of the cancer with three-dimensional accuracy. This exact targeting makes it possible to use higher levels of radiation in treatment, in hopes that it will be more effective in shrinking and killing tumors while minimizing damage to nearby tissues.
Understanding Homologous Recombination Deficiency
Cells with homologous recombination deficiency (HRD) are less able to repair double strand breaks in DNA and hence more vulnerable to DNA damaging treatments, such as chemotherapy and radiation therapy. HRD may result from alterations in genes that play a critical role in certain DNA repair mechanisms, including the BRCA genes.
Continue reading the article here to learn how you can participate in the study.