Radon and Radioactive Seed Volume Implants for Extensive Recurrent Vaginal-Pelvic Cancer

Abstract

Gynecological cancers arising in the cervix, corpus, ovaries, or fallopian tubes, like rectal and rectosigmoid cancers, not infrequently involve the vagina, paravagina, and perineum as well as the true pelvis beyond these structures, either by direct continuity spread or by “skip” lymphatic retrograde metastasis. The involvement occurs usually when disease persists or recurs following definitive surgical, radiotherapeutic, or combined treatment. This extensive recurrent vaginal-pelvic disease is in most patients not amenable even to exenteration. External radiation modalities also are limited by the intense vulval-anal skin reactions that appear if curative doses are attempted. Furthermore, conventional radium needle implants do not provide a technic of delivering cancerocidal doses to large inaccessible volumes of cancer. In 1958 the author modified the “Henschke” iridium-192 removable nylon ribbon interstitial implant technic (1) and developed the “blind-end” method applicable to carcinoma of the rectum...