Related Links
- 100 years of RT at the Netherlands Cancer Institute
- The Curie Museum in Paris
- Mould, R. F., A Century of X-Rays and Radioactivity in Medicine: With Emphasis on Photographic Records of the Early Years, Institute of Physics Publishing, Bristol. (1993) ISBN 9780750302241
- Thwaites, D. I. and Tuohy, J. B., Back to the future: the history and development of the clinical linear accelerator, Phys Med Biol, 51 (2006) R343–R362
- Jones, A., The development of megavoltage X-ray therapy at St Bartholomew’s Hospital and G. S. Innes, The one million volt X-ray therapy equipment at St Bartholomew’s Hospital 1936-60, Br J Radiol, Supplement 22 (1988)
- Khan, F. M., The physics of radiation therapy, 4th edn, Williams and Wilkins, Baltimore. (2009) ISBN 9780781788564
- Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group
- The British Society for the History of Radiology
- Jennings, W. A., Evolution over the past century of quantities and units in radiation dosimetry, J Radiol Prot, 27 (2007) 5–16
- Christie, D. and Tansey, E., Development of Physics Applied to Medicine in the UK, 1945-1990, Published by WT CTR FOR THE HISTORY OF MEDI 01/06/2015 ( 2015), ISBN 9780854841080.
- Hewitt, H., Rationalizing radiotherapy: some historical aspects of the endeavour, Br J Radiol, 46 (1973) 917-926
History of radiotherapy – a short introduction
Radiotherapy has its origins in the aftermath of the discovery of x-rays in 1895 and of radioactivity in 1896. Through scientific discoveries, trial and error, and technology advances, standardised approaches in external beam radiotherapy and brachytherapy were developed. Also, the development of the fields of radiobiology and radiation metrology was particularly important in making radiotherapy an effective treatment modality for cancer therapy.External beam radiotherapy began with superficial and orthovoltage therapy with x-ray tubes and teletherapy with sealed radioactive sources. St Bartholomew’s Hospital pushed the limits of technology with the 1 MV x-ray tube in the 1940’s. Megavoltage therapy matured in the 1950’s with the development of the Cobalt-60 machine along with the medical linear accelerator. The betatron and microtron have also been used in radiotherapy. Hospital-based particle therapy arrived in 1989 and there are currently 57 particle therapy facilities worldwide in operation.
Brachytherapy using sealed sources began with Radium-226 (1901), and then followed brachytherapy with Radon-222 seeds, Caesium-137, Iridium-192 and Cobalt-60 sources, while other isotopes including Iodine-125 and Gold-198 have proved effective. Brachytherapy with beta sources such as Strontium-90 and Ruthenium-106 has niche uses. Various manual loading systems have been superseded by modern high-dose-rate Iridium-192 and Cobalt-60 afterloader systems and automated systems for delivery of Iodine-125 seeds to the prostate.