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Radiation Oncology
Published in: Radiation Oncology 1/2014

Open Access 01-12-2014 | Review

Hypofractionated radiotherapy for prostate cancer

Authors: Nina-Sophie Hegemann, Matthias Guckenberger, Claus Belka, Ute Ganswindt, Farkhad Manapov, Minglun Li

Published in: Radiation Oncology | Issue 1/2014

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Abstract

In the last few years, hypofractionated external beam radiotherapy has gained increasing popularity for prostate cancer treatment, since sufficient evidence exists that prostate cancer has a low α/β ratio, lower than the one of the surrounding organs at risk and thus there is a potential therapeutic benefit of using larger fractionated single doses. Apart from the therapeutic rationale there are advantages such as saving treatment time and medical resources and thereby improving patient’s convenience. While older trials showed unsatisfactory results in both standard and hypofractionated arm due to insufficient radiation doses and non-standard contouring of target volumes, contemporary randomized studies have reported on encouraging results of tumor control mostly without an increase of relevant side effects, especially late toxicity. Aim of this review is to give a detailed analysis of relevant, recently published clinical trials with special focus on rationale for hypofractionation and different therapy settings.
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Metadata
Title
Hypofractionated radiotherapy for prostate cancer
Authors
Nina-Sophie Hegemann
Matthias Guckenberger
Claus Belka
Ute Ganswindt
Farkhad Manapov
Minglun Li
Publication date
01-12-2014
Publisher
BioMed Central
Published in
Radiation Oncology / Issue 1/2014
Electronic ISSN: 1748-717X
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/s13014-014-0275-6

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