PURPOSE The results from Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) 0617, a dose escalation trial that compared treatment with 60 Gy versus 74 Gy for patients with stage III non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), suggested that in these patients, the heart dose from radiation therapy correlates with survival. In particular, the study noted that patients with a high heart V5 and V30 had a poorer overa...

Traditional treatment beams for non-small-cell lung cancer are limited to the axial plane. For many tumor geometries, non-axial orientations appear to reduce the dose to normal tissues (e.g. heart, liver). We hypothesize that non-axial beams provide a significant reduction in incidental irradiation of the heart and liver, while maintaining adequate target coverage. CT scans of twenty-four patie...

Lowering heart rate reduces myocardial oxygen consumption (MVO2) and produces potent anti-ischemic effects. The development of selective heart rate-reducing agents represents an alternative approach to the use of beta-blockers. Therefore, our goal was to establish the dose-response curve of the effects of ivabradine (If channel inhibitor) on MVO2 and diastolic time. Seven conscious and chronica...

BACKGROUND The main adverse effects of beta 1 agonists relate to their systemic activity. The time course and dose response relations of the systemic effects of salmeterol compared with salbutamol were investigated. METHODS A double blind, randomised, crossover study was carried out in 14 healthy subjects who attended on seven days. Heart rate, QTc interval, blood pressure, plasma potassium a...

OBJECTIVE To test the hypothesis that use of aprotinin at hall dose would be more cost-effective or as efficacious as full-dose aprotinin or no aprotinin during open heart surgery. DESIGN Cost-effective analysis, unmasked prospective comparison. SETTING Community hospital. PATIENTS One hundred thirty-three patients undergoing open heart surgery. INTERVENTIONS Patients in 3 consecutive g...

Introduction: The complex geometry of breast and also lung and heart inhomogeneities near the planning target volume (PTV) result in perturbations in dose distribution. This problem can result in overdosage or underdosage in the match region of the three treatment fields. The purpose of this study is to create a homogeneous dose distribution in the match region between the supraclavicular and t...