DENVER, COLO., October 16, 2005 - GE Healthcare announced today that the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center has completed over 400 courses of radiation therapy with plans based on 4DCT since adopting GE's Advantage 4DCT scanning technology one-and-a-half years ago.

As one of the many medical institutions utilizing this technology, M.D. Anderson is at the forefront of making 4D imaging and planning standard practice for thoracic tumors offering the ability to target moving tumors for more effective treatment and less damage to healthy tissue during radiation.

"By utilizing 4DCT imaging we can more precisely define the true shape of tumors and how they move with respiration allowing us to choose the best treatment technique for each patient," explained Dr. Radhe Mohan, head of radiation physics for M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. "We are confident not only in its current applications but also in the significant future impact of this technology for improving radiation treatment outcomes while reducing treatment margins and radiation complications."
Many of the most commonly found tumors may be associated with respiratory movement. Advantage 4D technology images respiration-induced motion using data acquired by the Varian Medical Systems' RPM Respiratory Gating System and imaging data acquired by many GE CT scanners including the GE Discovery ST PET/CT scanner.

Image data is automatically sorted into multiple phases of the respiratory cycle. The Advantage 4D review display then enables clinicians to view the anatomy in motion in real time, thus improving confidence in target volume for either gated or un-gated treatment delivery. As a result, clinicians can more precisely irradiate the target of interest while sparing healthy tissue.

A contour visualization tool lets clinicians import contours and superimpose them over movie-looped (cine) images in multiple planes. This makes it easy to confirm the tumor motion and deformation relative to the planning target volume.

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