Finding cancer early remains a tenet of cancer treatment success. For radiologists and oncologists, that is just the start. It's what physicians do after the diagnosis -- and how well therapy eradicates the cancer -- that determines true success.

Nearly two-thirds of all cancer patients receive radiation therapy. MRI-guided radiotherapy holds the promise of allowing radiation oncologists to precisely deliver radiation, providing continuous images of the tumor and surrounding structures during treatment in real-time.

ViewRay Inc., a privately held medical device company, featured potential applications for its MRI-guided radiotherapy system at this year's annual meeting of the American Society for Radiation Oncology in Miami Beach, Fla. The company's radiotherapy system, currently used for research only, is being developed to feature a patented combination of radiotherapy delivery and simultaneous magnetic resonance imaging.
This technique has special applicability in soft-tissue cancers, where tumors tend to move. Lung cancer, for example, will move every day, as much as a few centimeters every three to four seconds, due to breathing, according to the company. This movement can make radiation therapy delivery an imprecise science. The ViewRay system is designed to provide pretreatment images and continuous soft-tissue imaging while the treatment beam is on. The system also automatically pauses if the tumor or critical structure moves out of a physician-defined boundary. The system automatically turns on when the structure moves back in the boundary.

The ViewRay system lets clinicians clearly see the tumor and know where the dose is being delivered, as it's being delivered without exposing the patient to unnecessary ionizing radiation, according to the company. The system is also being designed to predict the needed dose, based on the pre-treatment MR image and the planning image. If the dose doesn't meet prescription criteria, the physician can be called to decide the next treatment step, a company release stated.

Earlier this year, ViewRay, based in Oakwood Village, Ohio, received patents for its core technology in both the United States and Europe. ViewRay's treatment planning and delivery software recently received 510(k) premarket notification clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and its integrated imaging and radiotherapy delivery system is now pending 510(k) review. The ViewRay system is currently available only as a non-human use research system.

Other countries and companies are also developing similar technology.

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