Tomorrow’s Medicine … Today
from BestHealth, November 2003

The day after Gail Hurt had Gamma Knife Stereotactic Radiosurgery treatment for a rare brain tumor, she was up and running — literally. Rather than facing a long recovery from open surgery, she got up and ran five miles.

Wrapped around her carotid artery, a glomus jugulare tumor had been causing heart palpitations, blood pressure spikes and problems with Hurt’s hearing, voice and swallowing. Challenging to diagnose, the tumor also posed surgical challenges — open surgery would likely cause serious neurological deficits.

Fortunately for Hurt, there was another option. Since Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center opened North Carolina’s only Gamma Knife unit in 1999, patients have come from across the U.S. to Winston-Salem to benefit from this non-invasive, outpatient brain surgery performed by one of the nation’s most experienced treatment teams.

Hurt, who works at Wake Forest’s Comprehensive Cancer Center, had heard success stories. “I felt a weight lifted to learn that Gamma Knife was an alternative treatment,” she said.

The Gamma Knife painlessly bombards targeted tissue with ultra-focused radiation, sparing surrounding tissue. Delivering results that may equal or even surpass open-incision surgery — without the associated pain, risk or recuperation — it is “next generation” medicine, says neurosurgeon Stephen Tatter, M.D., Ph.D., who co-chairs the Gamma Knife Center with radiation oncologist Edward Shaw, M.D.

“Instead of facing a long and uncertain recovery after neurosurgery, I was back to business as usual the day after Gamma Knife. I feel very, very fortunate to have had this alternative,” said Hurt.

Hurt’s follow-up Magnetic Resonance Imaging test last February showed good news: Her tumor was no longer growing. Gamma Knife treatment had stopped it in its tracks.

Gamma Knife Facts

• The Gamma Knife is not a knife at all. It is a device that delivers gamma radiation very precisely to targeted tissue, sparing normal tissue from damage. The multidisciplinary Gamma Knife team — neurosurgeons, radiation oncologists and radiation physicists — perfectly match the radiation dose to the 3-dimensional shape of the lesion. Gamma rays are delivered painlessly through a head-frame attached to the patient’s scalp.

• Gamma Knife typically treats benign and malignant brain tumors, acoustic neuromas, blood vessel malformations in the brain (arteriovenous malformations or AVMs) and functional disorders such as trigeminal neuralgia, which causes intense facial pain.

• Many patients return home shortly after the 4–8 hour procedure, with no risks of infection, bleeding or anesthesia after-effects. Results occur over a period of months.