Best of International Stereotactic Radiosurgery Society Congress 2013: Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy. Part I: Spinal Tumors

Abstract

The 11th biennial International Stereotactic Radiosurgery Society Congress represented another historical gathering of professionals in the field of stereotactic radiosurgery. This congress was held on 16-20 June 2013 in Toronto (ON, Canada), and the chairman was Arjun Sahgal, the co-chair was Michael Schwartz and president of the society was Jean Regis. The congress attracted 550 attendants from all over the world and over 300 abstracts were presented. Among the abstracts presented, 62 (36 oral) were pertaining to stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT). Exciting new findings were presented by colleagues from North America, Europe and Asia. This short conference scene (part I) provides a summary of the best abstracts on SBRT for spinal tumors presented in the congress. A separate conference scene on SBRT for nonspinal tumors (part II) also appears in this issue of Future Oncology.

Technical Note: A custom‐designed flexible MR coil array for spine radiotherapy treatment planning

“…Radiotherapy is an established component of the multidisciplinary treatment of spine metastases, and spine stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) or stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) has shown promising long-term local control of these radioresistant tumors. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] For paraspinal tumors, the spinal cord is often only a few millimeters away from the planning target volume, and despite SBRT's steep dose gradient, even millimeters of uncertainty in the location of the cord will result in significant dosimetric uncertainties. Furthermore, because of the precise tumor targeting provided by SRS and SBRT, an increasing number of patients are being referred for re-irradiation of nearby recurrent disease.…”