Palliative radiotherapy. Dr Aznar

Palliative radiotherapy is a type of radiation therapy used not to cure cancer, but to relieve symptoms and improve quality of life for patients with advanced or incurable cancer. It focuses on controlling pain, bleeding, or other problems caused by tumors.

Key Points:

 

  • Purpose: Symptom relief rather than cure.
  • Common Indications:
    • Bone pain from metastases
    • Brain metastases (to reduce pressure/symptoms)
    • Bleeding tumors (e.g., lung, bladder)
    • Tumor obstruction (e.g., airway, esophagus)

Features:

  • Shorter treatment courses: Often delivered over fewer sessions (e.g., 1–10 fractions).
  • Lower doses than curative radiotherapy: Enough to control symptoms with minimal side effects.
  • Rapid symptom relief: Pain relief can begin within days.

Benefits:

  • Improved quality of life
  • Reduced need for strong pain medications
  • May allow patients to spend more time at home or in comfort

Palliative radiotherapy is used to prevent symptoms and skeletal-related events.

In the context of cancer, bony events (also called skeletal-related events, or SREs) refer to complications that arise when cancer spreads to the bones (bone metastases). These are common in advanced cancers like breast, prostate, lung, thyroid, and renal cell carcinoma.

Common Bony Events / SREs:

  1. Bone pain – Often severe and persistent; major cause of decreased quality of life
  2. Pathological fractures – Bones weakened by metastases can break with minimal trauma.
  3. Spinal cord compression – Tumors in the spine may press on the spinal cord, causing pain, neurological deficits, or paralysis.
  4. Hypercalcemia of malignancy – High calcium levels due to bone breakdown, leading to confusion, nausea, dehydration, or coma.
  5. Need for orthopedic surgery or radiotherapy – To stabilize bone or relieve pain/compression.