A cancer diagnosis can often mean many trips to the doctor’s office for chemotherapy or radiation. For some breast cancer patients, Avera offers an effective and efficient option for treating their disease, called intraoperative radiation therapy.
Colleen Springer’s breast cancer journey started back in August when she went to the doctor for a routine mammogram appointment in Gregory.
“Unfortunately they had to call me back in and my first initial thought was ‘I don’t have time for this, are you serious,’ but I went back in because they did find a spot,” said Springer, an Avera patient. “I came to Sioux Falls and they did a biopsy here and it turned out to be cancer. I met with Dr. Bryan after that and we went over my options.”
Living nearly three hours away, Springer needed an option that best fit her lifestyle.
“That diagnosis of an early breast cancer offered her some different options which would include surgery, but either just taking the area of the tumor, which does come with radiation, or a full mastectomy, which is taking the whole breast,” said breast surgeon, Avera Medical Group, Michelle Bryan, MD, PhD. “For her, being able to offer her an option of less driving and more focused radiation really made the difference in what she was able to choose for surgery.”
Collaboration between Dr. Bryan and Avera Medical Group radiation oncologist Charles Murphy, MD, it was decided Springer would benefit from intraoperative radiation therapy, which involves a combination of surgery and radiation.
“Intraoperative radiation therapy is an option where instead of all the doses of radiation being delivered externally and for the radiation oncologist to deliver each of those beams in separate office visits, often from three to six weeks, it can actually deliver the entire dose intraoperatively at the time of the surgery,” said Bryan.
“It’s definitely case by case, some women are candidates, some are not, it’s definitely important to have the conversation with the doctor knowing that it may or may not be an option but we always go through all of the options with our patients,” Murphy said.
IORT is ideal for patients with early stage breast cancer. Springer’s surgery was scheduled for October.
“The first thing we do is check the lymph nodes and that’s in the armpit because we want to make sure there is no lymph node spread. The next thing we did was actually open up and remove the tumor, I then separate the tissue around and in order to separate that out, I want to make sure that I’m bringing together so that it can fit right under the radiation delivery column, the tissue that I want to deliver all of that dose to.”
“I would go up with my team which is a physicist, a couple of radiation therapists and at that point I take over in terms of deciding how we would want to deliver that radiation and setting that part up with Dr. Bryan so we are collaborating in the operating room, and then I plan that with my physics team and we deliver the treatment,” said Murphy.
“Big team for shortening up some treatment for the patient,” said Bryan.
“It was the right treatment, because my cancer was grade 1 and the one-time radiation could do it. If I had to drive days or for months, you do what you have to do to live, and I would have done that. But I’m so grateful they could find the right treatment for me in the timeframe they did,” said Springer.
Now she is cancer free and recognizes the care she received made a difference in her cancer journey.
“They were amazing, the providers here, the doctors here, they really explain things, and they make you feel like you’re the only patient they’ve ever had, they really sit down with you and explain it all to you and take the time with you,” said Springer.
Patients who benefit from intraoperative radiation therapy are typically those in an early stage with small tumors.
