A robot radiotherapy machine to treat cancer, called the Cyberknife, will be introduced in Britain in February next year.

Since the machine moves with a patient's breathing, it can target tumours with greater accuracy, and the likelihood of damage to healthy tissue will be less.

The machine will be available at the private Harley Street Clinic in London.

It is already being used in over a dozen countries worldwide, including France that has three under clinical trial.

The cyberknife uses a robotic arm to deliver multiple beams of high dose radiation from a wide variety of angles.

It also consists of X-ray cameras that monitor the patient's breathing, and help re-position the radiotherapy beam accordingly, in order to minimise damage to healthy tissue.

The machine's makers say that this accuracy helps treat even such tumours as are in dangerous or difficult positions, like near the spinal cord.

The French National Cancer Institute is trying three Cyberknife machines at hospitals in Nice, Nancy and Lille.

The machines have shown promising results so far.

"We have treated just over 200 patients in 18 months and all couldn't have been treated with conventional radiotherapy so it is a big plus for our patients," the BBC quoted Professor Eric Lartigau, from the Centre Oscar Lambret in Lille, as saying.

Fifteen countries including the USA, Germany, Italy and Japan have the Cyberknife. It is also installed in hospitals in Vietnam, Turkey and Greece.

Source-ANI
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