Abstract
The CATANA proton therapy center was the first Italian clinical facility making use of energetic (62 MeV) proton beams for the radioactive treatment of solid tumors. Since the date of the first patient treatment in 2002, 294 patients have been successful treated whose majority was affected by choroidal and iris melanomas. In this paper, we report on the current clinical and physical status of the CATANA facility describing the last dosimetric studies and reporting on the last patient follow-up results. The last part of the paper is dedicated to the description of the INFN-LNS ongoing activities on the realization of a beamline for the transport of laser-accelerated ion beams for future applications. The ELIMED (ELI-Beamlines MEDical and multidisciplinary applications) project is introduced and the main scientific aspects will be described.
Highlights
In developed countries, radiotherapy together with surgery is the most used approach for cancer therapy
We developed a dedicated module inside the Hadrontherapy application to study the Linear Energy Transfer (LET)-dose distributions in configurations that are of interest for radiobiology experiments [28]
During the first 14 years of clinical activity, more than 300 patients have been treated at CATANA facility
Summary
Radiotherapy together with surgery is the most used approach for cancer therapy. From many different reasons and aspects, is still a pioneering technique, its relevance in the clinical world and superiority with respect to the conventional radiation is evident for many clinical cases. It represents the election therapy in most of the choroidal and iris melanomas occurrences. Despite the evident advantage over conventional radiotherapy, the spread is limited by the high costs and complexity of the facilities. In this framework, the authors in Ref. The necessary maximum range and energy modulation are achieved by means of a set of Perspex absorbers, variable in thickness, and modulator wheels
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