Hi Carol,
I met with Brigham & Women's Hospital in Boston last Thursday to dicuss their "conventional radio-therapy" treatments as well. They have been on the forefront of LINAC treatments and certainly do know their stuff. I met with the Director of RadioSurgery and he was sharing with me the advantages and disadvantages of "conventional radio-therapy" (they have Novalis), the application of a "frameless" system (he said their mask was more "rigid" than others"),their use of imaging during the process. He did elaborate on expanding the number of doses that he would use on me and, in my case, he could shorten them up (from 27 consective day doses to 5 consecutive day doses), etc. They have been doing the treatments for years and claim to do approx 50/year
I also met with the Cyberknife team at Boston's Beth Israel Hospital (the only CK in New England, although I have confirmed a "purchasing req" has been issued for one at Brigham/Women's). For me, I have opted for CK at BI. CK has only been at BI for 7 mos and they have only done 3-4 AN's in that time. Trust me, that was the only "con" to my Pro/con list for BI. Like you, I would have liked to see more AN's treated there, but I know BI and their reputation and their team. Thus, my final decision.
Proton treatments, from my understanding, are done at Mass General Hosp and Loma Linda (CA). Anther viable treatment choice. Have heard some failures, minimal successes (one success on this board, as a matter of fact!).
The bottom line in making my decision was the "accuracy" factor. In a tumor your size, I cannot say that accuracy should be the only factor (mine is smaller than your's, so in my case, that machine better be accurate to nail this sucker!) but the CK machine does have better accuracy than the GK and Novalis. All are efficient modes of radio-treatments, so I guess that in doing your research, find out, based on the exact size and location of your growth, choose one that will bring you mental comfort, choose one that you faith in the team that is doing the treatments, choose one that will work with you step-by-step in answering ALL your questions, provide post-treatment support to you. All of the radio-treatments are viable treatments... to me, the accuracy of the aim of treatment was the key. Your situation may warrant a different reasoning for choice.
Know that we are all here for you.
Phyllis
