What to Expect When Entering Radiation Therapy

Radiation therapy, often referred to as has many uses. While it is useful for the treatment of non-malignant conditions such as thyroid eye disease, it is most commonly used as the result of a cancer diagnosis and as part of a treatment regiment to control malignant tumors.
When used to treat cancer, radiation therapy is often administered in conjunction with surgery and chemotherapy. In operable cases, surgery may be conducted to remove as much of the cancer as possible, then treatment is followed up by radiation therapy to kill any remaining cancer cells. The same is true of treatment in conjunction with chemotherapy. In some cases, a combination of all three treatments will be used.
To treat a person with radiation therapy, a doctor known as a radiation oncologist directs high energy x-rays at the patient’s body in order to kill cancer cells and prevent their growth and proliferation. These x-rays are the same as those administered to image bones and teeth, and just like an x-ray of your arm or teeth, it is not painful. However, the concentration of x-rays is much higher as its purpose is to kill living cells rather than just obtain an image.
At such high doses, the x-rays are capable of killing not just the cancerous cells, but health tissue as well. Radiation therapy works, however, because healthy cells that are damaged are better able to recover whereas cancerous cells have a more difficult time. To minimize
damage to healthy cells, the radiation is targeted to the part of the body where the cancer resides.
Common side effects include fatigue, nausea, decreased immune response, hair loss, and others. Side effects often result from the radiation of healthy tissue. However, new technologies are increasing the precision of radiation therapy, thereby reducing side effects and improving success rates.