Increasing Clinical Confidence with Catalyst+ HD and Elekta’s Versa HD

High-tech patient care with a multidisciplinary approach to treatment of cancer is the hallmark of the Willis-Knighton Cancer Center. Among the options available for external beam radiation therapy is the Elekta Versa HD linear accelerator equipped with C-RAD’s Catalyst+ HD. Daniel Speir, Chief Radiation Therapist, discusses the role of surface guided radiation therapy (SGRT) in patient care.

Voluntary or involuntary patient motion during radiotherapy beam delivery must be avoided or compensated for to ensure a safe and effective treatment. For several years we were interested in surface guided motion tracking, so four years ago we chose C-RAD’s Catalyst+ HD.

This solution provides us with high-precision patient positioning and intra-fraction motion management for radiotherapy on our Elekta Versa HD linear accelerator. Catalyst+ HD and Versa HD are very compatible and integrate well with each other.

C-RAD solutions provide maximum treatment precision

Catalyst⁺ HD helps me know that the patient is in the right position – giving me real-time assurance and clinical confidence that I’m targeting the correct region. If the patient moves, we’re able to see it immediately. It has definitely been a significant improvement in terms of ensuring accuracy in real time.

Willis-Knighton Cancer Center
Shreveport, La.

Workflow efficiency for the entire team

For our breast patient cases in particular, Catalyst+ HD has been quite useful in our 10-minute treatment slots. Before using Catalyst+ HD clinically, we tested the solution to determine if we would need to mark the patient. After this testing, we were confident that we would not need to perform this step, so from the very first day of Catalyst+ HD clinical use we proceeded without marking. In this way, the workflow has been extremely efficient and straightforward in terms of setting up the patient and setting parameters. There are not a lot of mouse clicks or extra steps to perform, which is very helpful in the day-to-day work of a therapist.

An evolving solution

Overall, I highly value the simplicity of Catalyst+ HD, which translates into a streamlined workflow. This is especially important when using breath-hold techniques, during which motion can be expected. And it’s also important that C-RAD is constantly innovating SGRT. The company continues to reach out to us on how the SGRT product can be improved year to year – never content to have Catalyst+ HD remain static and not extend its capabilities. In that sense, C-RAD is just like our cancer center.