Graded: Chapter 5 – Chemistry to Life Connections Forum
Energy is required for life, yet can be very destructive to it. This is the nature of radiation – energy emitted in the form of waves or particles. Your post for this unit involves medical uses of radiation, and includes two parts:
- A) Do some informal research and create a paragraph explaining why healthy tissues are damaged when radiation therapy is used to destroy cancer cells.
- B) One of the most promising advancements in radiation therapy is “proton therapy”, also called “proton beam therapy”. As an instructor and as an individual, | find it very important to learn about new technologies and be aware of options. Do some informal research on proton therapy and write a paragraph here explaining what the treatment is – how it is different from standard radiation therapy. Also, what are the current limitations to the widespread use of proton therapy to fight cancer nationwide?
Chapter 5 – Chemistry to Life Connections Forum
Radiation Therapy is a cancer treatment that utilizes powerful doses of radiation to eliminate cancer cells and diminishes tumor in the body. At a lower dosage, these radiation rays are used in X-rays to see the inside of someone’s body like for broken teeth and bones (cancer.gov, 2022).
Radiation Therapy is one of the chief techniques for the treatment of malignant diseases and it is utilized for both therapeutic and sedative purposes for all types of tumors (Wang & Tepper, 2021, p.445).
Radiation therapy works by breaking the DNA in a cell. These mechanisms resist the cancer cells from growing, splits the cells, and result in the death of the cells. Sometimes, the neighboring healthy cells are also destroyed by these procedures. Therefore, some healthy cells do get damaged by radiation therapy.
Proton therapy or proton beam therapy is also a radiation treatment that works on the mechanism of delivering proton beams to eliminate tumor cells. It uses beams of protons instead of using x-rays like radiation therapy (cancer.gov, 2022). As I have mentioned earlier, proton therapy uses proton particles to eliminate tumor cells, and hence it does not damage the neighboring cells, unlike radiation therapy. The only problem with proton therapy I think is that it is costly. Proton therapy requires costly apparatus and appliances and hence the treatment is also costly as compared to radiation therapy.
References
cancer.gov (2022) Proton Therapy retrieved from https://www.cancer.net/navigating-cancer-care/how-cancer-treated/radiation-therapy/proton-therapy [Retrieved on 25th August 2022]
cancer.gov (2022) Radiation Therapy to Treat Cancer retrieved from https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/treatment/types/radiation-therapy#:~:text=Radiation%20therapy%20(also%20called%20radiotherapy,your%20teeth%20or%20broken%20bones [Retrieved on 25th August 2022]
Wang, K., & Tepper, J. E. (2021). Radiation therapy‐associated toxicity: Etiology, management, and prevention. CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, 71(5), 437-454.
