Thanks for reading our page.

We are a group of cancer and radiotherapy specialists, at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham:

Geoff Heyes, Ruth Wyatt, Jason Cashmore, Daniel Kirby, Andrew Dumbill, Graham Chalmers, Helen Howard, Trevor Williams, Richard Hyman, Margaret Pantling, Marie Tiffany, Mark Tiffany, Jon Paine, Ben Allen, Stuart Green, Andrew Nixon, Paul Sanghera, Steve Horton and Jeff Palethorpe

Currently, we have to refer some of our patients to London for very complicated cancer treatment as there are no CyberKnife machines in the UK outside of London, and even then only if we can get that treatment agreed.

We want the Queen Elizabeth Hospital to be the first hospital outside of London with a CyberKnife machine so that we can offer hope to many more patients with serious cancers.

Our hospital charity launched an appeal last year for CyberKnife and they have nearly reached their target (www.qecancerappeal.org) and we want to do our bit to help out.

We're cycling 100 miles in one day from London to Birmingham to show just how far patients currently have to travel if they can get this treatment at all. It will be a challenge for us, but nowhere near as much of a challenge as our cancer patients have on a daily basis.

Please help us get CyberKnife into Birmingham by sponsoring us.

Many thanks

A grateful team anticipating very sore legs!

So what is a ‘CyberKnife’?

One method for treating cancers is via radiotherapy- where radiation is delivered to the tumour, whilst limiting the dose to surrounding healthy tissues. In brain tumours, the surrounding organs are much closer to the tumour, so the need for a highly accurate delivery system is vital.

CyberKnife is a radiotherapy delivery machine, that uses a robotic arm and sophisticated imaging system that will enable us to get a high dose to a tumour, whilst really limiting the dose to the surrounding normal tissue. The robot is the same as the ones used to do laser welding by car manufactures- so it can be positioned with an accuracy of around 0.1mm. The system as a whole includes the robot, the imaging system and a dedicated treatment planning system, all to housed in dedicated bunker here at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. It will mean that our patients will be able to benefit from state-of –the –art treatment without the need to travel down to the closest unit in London.

 

For more information about the CyberKnife, there is more information on the Queen Elizabeth website: http://www.qecancerappeal.org/

 

And on the Accuray (manufactures) website:

http://www.accuray.com/products/cyberknife-vsi-system