New facilities will help tackle cancer
HEALTH: State-of-the-art facilities which are being built in East Yorkshire will help offer more certainty in the treatment of prostate cancer, which affects one in eight men.
The Daisy Appeal is funding the Molecular Imaging Research Centre (MIRC), which is under construction at Castle Hill Hospital at Cottingham.
STATE-OF-THE-ART FACILITIES being built in East Yorkshire will help offer more certainty in the treatment of the most common cancer in men.
The Daisy Appeal is funding the Molecular Imaging Research Centre (MIRC), which is under construction at Castle Hill Hospital at Cottingham.
One of the issues with treating prostate cancer – which affects one in eight men – is that standard
PET (Positron Emission Tomography) scans are poor at showing up tumours which may reoccur after surgery or have spread elsewhere in the body. However new scans, which should be available at Castle Hill Hospital from next year, can reveal their presence “as clear as day”.
Prof Steve Archibald, of the Positron Emission Tomography Research Centre at the University of Hull, said it should help in cases where patients have had surgery for prostate cancer, but then have a positive blood test. He said: “There’s a real problem understanding what these blood tests mean. The clinician can send you for a scan and nothing shows up.
“Even with the standard PET scan you don’t see anything – but with this you see the small tumours clear as day.”
The test, known as 68Ga-PSMA, has not yet been approved by the NHS for routine use, but is available in other countries and privately at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London.
The aim is that 250 to 500 of the tests should be available in the first year. Prof Archibald said Castle Hill would be one of the first places in UK offering the scan routinely and linking it to new treatments.
He added: “It’s really exciting – like having a new tool in the tool box that just wasn’t available before.”
The MIRC will produce radioactive chemicals called tracers for medical imaging of patients having scans at the adjacent Jack Brignall centre.
Until now the tracers have been brought in from elsewhere, limiting their effectiveness, but the new equipment will allow staff to produce them onsite as well as developing their own.
Prof Archibald said: “PET/CT scans are a technology that has been around a long time but is only coming to its full potential now.” The tracers can also be used in viral research, to see how the body is being affected by a disease like Covid-19 and how it responds to therapy. “You are getting exquisitely sensitive information about how the body is behaving,” said Prof Archibald. “For example, you could see a miniature clot in the lungs before you see the physical response in a patient.
“It will also help with things like Alzheimer’s when you want to understand how the brain is starting to change. Right now we catch the disease at such a late stage it is almost too late to do anything for the patient. If you catch it early you can treat it much more effectively.”
With this you see the small tumours clear as day.
Prof Steve Archibald, of the Positron Emission Tomography Research Centre.