St. Joseph's Hospital Barrow Neurological Institute stereitatic radiotherapy experience comparison of Gamma Knife and CyberKnife

The clinical utilisation stereotactic radiotherapy continues to increase in breadth and scope within the medical community. However, no single standard treatment platform exists for the delivery of stereotactic radiotherapy treatments. This is because although there are several commercially available platforms capable of delivering stereotactic radiotherapy treatments, each platform has unique abilities and limitations. The most widely used stereotactic radiotherapy system for intracranial treatments is the Gamma Knife. The first image guided robotic stereotactic radiotherapy system enabling body stereotactic radiotherapy is the CyberKnife. Both are available at the Barrow Neurological Institute. We describe our experience with the complementary use of these two distinct treatment platforms. This permits us to make a meaningful comparison and to detail their contrasting advantages and disadvantages for state of the art for stereotactic radiotherapy. (author)