"For adjuvant breast radiotherapy 26Gy in 5 fractions is isotoxic compared with 40.05Gy in 15 fractions and may mitigate a deferred start date in patients with node negative breast cancer".
I'm not medically trained but reading between the lines - I 'think' it is basically saying they give a higher dose of rads to the tumour site and the normal dose to the closer surrounding tissue within safe standard Gy's allowance per patient and that by offering rads this way it can start sooner to save any delay in treatment ? Med speak is a minefield to try and figure out....
I would post this question in the Ask a Nurse area for a more experienced explanation, as I'm only taking a bit of a guess.
Not of much help but hopefully the nurse will come to the rescue... If you need an answer sooner you could try phoning the Rads or Oncology Unit ?
Thanks Dreamthief, for trying to explain that radiotherapy statement.
Unfortunately, it is not one that easily lends itself to lay interpretation.
Curiously, if the entire phrase is searched for online it repeatedly pops up, word for word even in Indian medical guidelines. I get the impression that it has originated in a document somewhere, and medics have thought that sounds good, and have judiciously cut and pasted it.
I did try to obtain a MacM explanation but was unsuccessful. As you say, I will probably have to contact a Radiology Department if I want to obtain a definitive explanation.
It was an identical UK document that I extracted that paragraph from. As I said they appear to be fairly ubiquitous.
Thank you too ClaireRus.
I must confess that I still don't understand the full phrase. I believe I need to because this is guiding the medics during the COVID situation and may be impacting my wife's RT delay.
Oww I'll add my two-penath.... I'm not medical and you will most likely see this from what follows....
Gy = Gray (unit) is the name given to the measurement of radiation.....
(Extract from Wikipedia)... The gray (symbol: Gy) is a derived unit of ionising radiation dose in the International System of Units (SI). It is defined as the absorption of one joule of radiation energy per kilogram of matter.
It is used as a unit of the radiation quantity absorbed dose that measures the energy deposited by ionising radiation in a unit mass of matter being irradiated, and is used for measuring the delivered dose of ionising radiation in applications such as radiotherapy, food irradiation and radiation sterilisation and predicting likely acute effects, such as acute radiation syndrome in radiological protection. As a measure of low levels of absorbed dose, it also forms the basis for the calculation of the radiation protection unit, the sievert, which is a measure of the health effect of low levels of ionising radiation on the human body.
"For adjuvant breast radiotherapy 26Gy in 5 fractions is isotoxic compared with 40.05Gy in 15 fractions and may mitigate a deferred start date in patients with node negative breast cancer".Grys
My thoughts (my thoughts alone, I am thinking a 'fraction' would be 'a day' - I don't know thought)....
Does it mean: if they give a 26Gy in 5 fractions this is less likely to cause a delay in starting treatment compared to the 40.05Gy in 15 fractions.
26Gy (strength) given in 5 fractions (1 week) is 'isotopic' compared with:- 40.05Gy (strength, stronger) given in 15 fractions (3 weeks) .....
(? I don't know, just my thoughts).
I may even be confusing the situation, there is this link, not sure if this helps at all....
(This relates to a trial... One Week Versus Three Week in Adjuvant Radiotherapy in Breast Cancer (HYPORTAdjuvant)....
