CyberKnife Features & Advantages, Gamma Knife vs. Cyberknife, Features & Advantages of CyberKnife - Stanford Hospital & Clinics

Features & Advantages

Features of the CyberKnife	Advantages
Frameless system	Does not require a head frame screwed into the skull for immobilization, avoiding the pain, headache, nausea and risk of infection seen at times with stereotactic frames. Instead, a non-invasive thermoplastic head mask and image guidance allows stereotactic immobilization.
Flexible, frameless system, allowing single session or multi-session treatments	Frameless design provides the flexibility to perform radiosurgery in either a single day or over multiple days which allows your treating physicians to decide the safest and most effective course of treatment. When constrained by frame-based systems requiring treatment in one day, some tumors are untreatable, or would require under-dosing of the tumor (risking tumor recurrence) or over-dosing of critical structures (risking injury to the brain).
Proven accuracy in both the brain and in extra-cranial sites	Accuracy (<1mm ) is equivalent to rigid, frame-based systems. Recent total clinical accuracy for spine 0.61mm.*
Able to treat both intra-cranial and extra-cranial sites with stereotactic accuracy	Your physicians have the ability to treat brain tumors, as well as tumors of the lung, spine, pancreas, liver, prostate, and other sites.
Multi-modality image fusion	Your physicians have the option to use the best imaging study for your tumor, including CT, 4-dimensional CT, MRI and PET scans.
Image guidance, tracking tumors that move with respiration	Movement of tumors during breathing, such as in the lung, pancreas, and liver, is automatically tracked and compensated, allowing minimization of treatment of normal structures and decreased toxicity of therapy.
Safely treat tumors that were previously untreatable	Even in the setting of prior radiotherapy, your physicians may be able to re-treat tumors near the spine and spinal cord.
Linear accelerator-based treatment	Megavoltage x-rays are used to treat the target, over 4 times more powerful than the energy from natural sources such as Cobalt. No need to dispose of radioactivity.

* Ho et al A Study of the Accuracy of Cyberknife Spinal Radiosurgery using Skeletal Structure Tracking, Neurosurgery 60[ONS Suppl 1]:ONS-147–ONS-156, 2007