For a year now, University Hospital Zurich (USZ) has been using its MRI Linac unit to achieve the highest levels of precision in complex cancer treatments. The new equipment combines magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with radiotherapy, enabling doctors to track the position of a tumor in real time and constantly optimize irradiation to make the treatment kinder on the patient’s body.
“We’ve seen groundbreaking improvements,” summarizes Professor Nicolaus Andratschke, deputy head of the Department of Radiation Oncology at USZ. In the first year 120 patients were treated. The MRI Linac machine makes it possible to treat even highly mobile tumors with a high dose of radiation. While the average treatment session with the novel equipment lasts an hour, twice as long as for conventional radiotherapy, it has a major advantage: In many cases the higher dose massively reduces the number of radiotherapy treatments necessary. For example around five sessions, compared with up to 35 previously, now suffice for prostate carcinoma.
The MRI Linac is also being deployed in research as part of clinical trials. University Hospital Zurich is playing a pioneering role in the use of the high-tech machine. In 2019, for example, USZ became the first in the world to deploy MRI Linac equipment outside oncology, using it for radiosurgery on the heart. It cost around eight million francs to acquire the machine, part of which was covered by the Baugarten Foundation in Zurich via the USZ Foundation.
More about MRI Linac (Website USZ, in German)
Article on MRI Linac (USZ Foundation)