Predictors of Postoperative Complications in Vestibular Schwannoma Surgery-A Population-Based Study.

Objective: To investigate preoperative patient demographics and comorbidities in relation with postsurgical complications following vestibular schwannoma surgery.

Study Design: Retrospective population-based cohort study.

Setting: All hospitals in the Canadian province of Ontario.

High-Intensity Focused Ultrasound Ablation Therapy of Gliomas.

Ultrasound in clinical medicine is most commonly associated with imaging, but can be harnessed to yield an array of biological effects, including thermal ablation of brain tumors. Therapeutic ultrasound has been studied for many years, but only within the last decade has the technology reached a point where it is safe and practical for clinical adoption. Using large, multi-element arrays, ultrasound can be focused through the skull, and combined with MRI for image guidance and real-time thermometry, to create lesions in the brain with millimeter accuracy.

Enhancing drug delivery for boron neutron capture therapy of brain tumors with focused ultrasound.

Background: Glioblastoma is a notoriously difficult tumor to treat because of its relative sanctuary in the brain and infiltrative behavior. Therapies need to penetrate the CNS but avoid collateral tissue injury. Boron neutron capture therapy (BNCT) is a treatment whereby a (10)B-containing drug preferentially accumulates in malignant cells and causes highly localized damage when exposed to epithermal neutron irradiation.

The use of film dosimetry of the penumbra region to improve the accuracy of intensity modulated radiotherapy.

Accurate measurements of the penumbra region are important for the proper modeling of the radiation beam for linear accelerator-based intensity modulated radiation therapy. The usual data collection technique with a standard ionization chamber artificially broadens the measured beam penumbrae due to volume effects. The larger the chamber, the greater is the spurious increase in penumbra width.