Publications by authors named "Sunjay Shah"
Article Synopsis
- The main issue with radiosurgery for treating trigeminal neuralgia (TN) is that it can cause facial numbness, which can be really hard to deal with.
- To help reduce this numbness while still treating the pain, doctors used a special method where patients received treatment over three days instead of just one.
- In a study with 48 patients, 84% found relief from their pain after treatment, although some did experience numbness later on.
Article Synopsis
- There is ongoing debate about how to effectively manage high-risk arteriovenous malformations (AVMs), with traditional surgical methods posing challenges and stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) having less than 50% success rates alongside high radiation necrosis rates, especially for larger AVMs.
- A pilot study tested a new approach using specific doses of radiation, administered in three or five sessions, aimed to deliver a biologically effective dose equivalent to 20 Gy in a single session to overcome past treatments' failures.
- The study included 37 patients, all of whom achieved complete AVM obliteration within an average follow-up period of just over 26 months, demonstrating promising outcomes for this alternative SRS method.
Primary cardiac sarcoma is a rare malignant tumor that arises from the cardiac myocardium. Surgical resection is the standard of care, and median survival ranges from 6 to 12 months. The role of salvage chemotherapy and radiation is not well defined.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: To evaluate the clinical feasibility of the Siemens Healthineers AI-Rad Companion Organs RT VA30A (Organs-RT) auto-contouring algorithm for organs at risk (OARs) of the pelvis, thorax, and head and neck (H&N).
Methods: Computed tomography (CT) datasets from 30 patients (10 pelvis, 10 thorax, and 10 H&N) were collected. Four sets of OARs were generated on each scan, one set by Organs-RT and the others by three experienced users independently.
Craniopharyngiomas are rare epithelial malformations in the sellar or suprasellar regions of the craniopharyngeal ducts. Complete surgical resection is difficult due to the location of the base of the skull and the risk of injury to vital neurological structures. Fractionated radiation is effective in controlling residual tumors, but craniopharyngiomas can progress during treatment.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFArticle Synopsis
- * The trial involved 518 adults, with HA-WBRT + memantine resulting in less cognitive decline and lower reported symptom burdens at 6 and 12 months compared to standard treatment.
- * Although HA-WBRT + memantine improved cognitive outcomes and symptom reporting, both treatment groups had similar overall survival rates and side effects.
Objective: To determine the long-term normal tissue complication probability with stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) treatments for targets that move with respiration and its relation with the type of respiratory motion management (tracking . compression or gating).
Methods: A PubMed search was performed for identifying literature regarding dose, volume, fractionation, and toxicity (grade 3 or higher) for SBRT treatments for tumors which move with respiration.
Purpose: Radiation dose to the neuroregenerative zone of the hippocampus has been found to be associated with cognitive toxicity. Hippocampal avoidance (HA) using intensity-modulated radiotherapy during whole-brain radiotherapy (WBRT) is hypothesized to preserve cognition.
Methods: This phase III trial enrolled adult patients with brain metastases to HA-WBRT plus memantine or WBRT plus memantine.
Malignancies arising from the central nervous system are rare. Brain metastases, in contrast, are perhaps the most common neurologic complication of cancer. Radiotherapy, as part of combined modality therapy, continues to evolve with the advancement of stereotactic radiosurgery indications, the addition of new technologies, such as alternating electric field therapy, and mounting advances in the complex biology of these entities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Pilocytic astrocytoma is a rare tumor in adults. This report is of a prospective clinical trial with long-term follow-up.
Methods: Between 1986 and 1994, 20 eligible adults with supratentorial pilocytic astrocytomas were enrolled in a prospective intergroup trial of radiotherapy (RT) after biopsy (3 patients) or observation after gross (11 patients) or subtotal (6 patients) resection.
Background: Common acute-term side effects of brain radiotherapy (RT) include fatigue, drowsiness, decreased physical functioning, and decreased quality of life (QOL). We hypothesized that armodafinil (a wakefulness-promoting drug known to reduce fatigue and increase cognitive function in breast cancer patients receiving chemotherapy) would result in reduced fatigue and sleepiness for patients receiving brain RT.
Methods: A phase II, multi-institutional, placebo-controlled randomized trial assessed feasibility of armodafinil 150 mg/day in participants receiving brain RT, from whom we obtained estimates of variability for fatigue, sleepiness, QOL, cognitive function, and treatment effect.
Purpose: Hippocampal neural stem-cell injury during whole-brain radiotherapy (WBRT) may play a role in memory decline. Intensity-modulated radiotherapy can be used to avoid conformally the hippocampal neural stem-cell compartment during WBRT (HA-WBRT). RTOG 0933 was a single-arm phase II study of HA-WBRT for brain metastases with prespecified comparison with a historical control of patients treated with WBRT without hippocampal avoidance.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: A phase 3 Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) study subset analysis demonstrated improved overall survival (OS) with the addition of stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) to whole brain radiation therapy (WBRT) in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with 1 to 3 brain metastases. Because temozolomide (TMZ) and erlotinib (ETN) cross the blood-brain barrier and have documented activity in NSCLC, a phase 3 study was designed to test whether these drugs would improve the OS associated with WBRT + SRS.
Methods And Materials: NSCLC patients with 1 to 3 brain metastases were randomized to receive WBRT (2.