The Christie NHS FT Annual Report & Accounts 2019-20

The Christie NHS Foundation Trust Annual Report & Accounts 2019-20

Radiotherapy

We have delivered major service improvements during the year and we have dedicated significant investment to support the development of cutting edge radiotherapy. Our radiotherapy department has continued with its tradition of supporting innovation and research in ensuring our patients have access to the latest equipment and treatments as well as access to the latest clinical trials. We have two other radiotherapy centres in Oldham and

Salford; the Salford centre also offers a specialist stereotactic radiosurgery service which is used to treat small malignant and benign brain and spine lesions, providing a highly specialist state of the art service to Greater Manchester and Cheshire. Radiotherapy fractions Almost eight and a half thousand patients have been treated with radiotherapy during 2019 which equates to over 107,000 treatment fractions, delivered over our three sites.

Equipment provision We have ten linear accelerators (or linacs) at our Withington site, with two linear accelerators at our Salford site and two at Oldham as part of our strategy to treat patients closer to home. During 2019-20 we continued the introduction of a method of reducing the dose of radiation delivered to the heart and its associated arteries during breast radiotherapy. Deep Inspiration Breath-Hold (DIBH) has the potential to reduce long term adverse events. The treatment is now routinely delivered with four linear accelerators capable of this treatment. The Trust has used this

technology innovatively to develop a method of using the DIBH technique in patients with lymphomas in appropriate disease sites. Expansion of clinical services to the wider community is being continued with the development of The Christie@Macclesfield. Technique improvement As older models of linear accelerators have been phased out on our Withington site, capacity for improved treatment techniques have increased. This has seen the use of Volumetric Modulated

7