How long does prostate radiation last?

Treatment sessions only last around 10 minutes, including the time it takes to get you into position. You don't need to stay in hospital overnight. Most men who have radiotherapy for pain find it helps control their pain. You might be able to reduce the dose of any pain-relieving drugs you're taking.

prostatecanceruk.org - Radiotherapy for advanced prostate cancer

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External beam radiotherapy

External beam radiotherapy is when high-energy X-ray beams are targeted at the area being treated from outside the body. Radiotherapy permanently damages and kills cancer cells, but healthy cells can repair themselves and recover more easily. External beam radiotherapy as part of a first treatment for advanced prostate cancer If you’ve just been diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer, you may be offered external beam radiotherapy to your prostate alongside other treatments. It won’t cure your cancer, but research has found that giving radiotherapy to the prostate itself can help some men with advanced prostate cancer live longer. Radiotherapy to the prostate will only be an option if the cancer has spread no further than your lymph nodes, or the bones in your pelvis or spine. Lymph nodes are part of your immune system and are found throughout your body. The treatment doesn’t appear to help men whose cancer has spread to bones away from the pelvis or spine, or to organs such as the liver. If you’re offered radiotherapy as a first treatment for advanced prostate cancer, you will have it alongside hormone therapy, often with chemotherapy as well.

External beam radiotherapy to treat symptoms

Advanced prostate cancer can cause symptoms in the areas it has spread to. External beam radiotherapy can help control these symptoms by slowing the growth of the cancer in those areas. You may hear this called palliative radiotherapy. For example, radiotherapy is an effective way of relieving pain caused by prostate cancer that has spread to the bones. You might hear cancer that has spread to the bones described as bone secondaries, bone metastases or bone mets. This isn’t the same as bone cancer, which starts in the bones. Most men who have external beam radiotherapy for bone pain get some pain relief from it. External beam radiotherapy can also treat prostate cancer that’s spread to the lymph nodes and can help with other symptoms of advanced prostate cancer, such as blood in the urine, bowel problems or kidney problems. It can also be used to treat an emergency condition called metastatic spinal cord compression (MSCC).

Other treatment options

If you’ve been offered radiotherapy to help control symptoms, there may be other treatments available to you instead. These might include:

pain-relieving drugs, which can be used alone or together with other treatments

treatments for the cancer itself, such as hormone therapy or chemotherapy.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of external beam radiotherapy?

The advantages and disadvantages of radiotherapy depend on your general health, previous treatment and how far your cancer has spread. What may be important to one person might be less important to someone else. Talk to your doctor, radiographer or nurse about your own situation. External beam radiotherapy to the prostate can help some men live longer if their cancer hasn’t spread far from the prostate.

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External beam radiotherapy is painless, but you may find the treatment position uncomfortable if you have pain. Treatment sessions only last around 10 minutes, including the time it takes to get you into position. You don’t need to stay in hospital overnight. Most men who have radiotherapy for pain find it helps control their pain. You might be able to reduce the dose of any pain-relieving drugs you’re taking. This could be useful if they are causing side effects. Radiotherapy may control other symptoms, such as blood in the urine and bowel problems. If your pain comes back, you may be able to have more external beam radiotherapy to the same area. This will depend on the dose you've already had and how long ago you had it.

Disadvantages

External beam radiotherapy to the prostate may not help men live longer if their prostate cancer has spread to distant bones or organs. If you’re having radiotherapy as a first treatment, you will need to go to a specialist hospital for treatment daily or weekly for a few weeks. This might be difficult if you need to travel far. If you’re having external beam radiotherapy to the prostate, your bowel may need to be empty during each treatment session. You may be given medicine to help empty your bowel each day. This can take a while to work, and some men find it inconvenient.

For a few men, radiotherapy won’t help to control their pain.

Like all cancer treatments, radiotherapy can cause side effects. The risk of different side effects depends on the part of the body being treated. You might have slightly more pain during treatment, and for a few days afterwards. This should soon improve. The pain can come back after several months. If this happens, you might need further treatment with radiotherapy or other treatments.

Preparing for treatment

You will have your treatment in the outpatient radiotherapy department at the hospital. Before starting treatment you will usually have a planning session. This might involve having a CT (computerised tomography) scan. The planning session is to make sure the person treating you knows the exact position, size and shape of the area that needs treating. At the end of your planning session, your radiographer will make a few very small permanent marks, like tiny tattoos, on your skin in the area to be treated. These help the radiographers put you in the right position for your treatment.

What does treatment involve?

If you’re having radiotherapy to the prostate alongside your first treatment for advanced prostate cancer, you may have radiotherapy five days a week for four weeks. Or you may have radiotherapy once a week for six weeks. If you’re having radiotherapy to treat symptoms such as pain, you’ll have either a single dose directed at the area causing problems, or a series of smaller doses spread out over a week or more. You might have a dose every day, every few days or once a week. This type of radiotherapy uses a lower dose of radiation overall than radiotherapy for earlier stages of prostate cancer. The course of treatment is also often shorter.

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If you’re having radiotherapy to your prostate, you will probably need to have an empty bowel during your treatment. Some hospitals ask you to have a full bladder and others ask you to empty your bladder. This helps to make sure the radiotherapy beams target the exact same area during each treatment, and reduces the risk of side effects to your bowel or bladder. Your radiographer may give you an enema (liquid medicine) or a suppository (a pellet) to use either at home or at the hospital. These are put inside your back passage and will help make sure your bowel is empty. At the beginning of each treatment, the radiographer will help you get into the right position on the treatment couch. They’ll use the marks made on your body as a guide. The radiographer will then leave the room, but they’ll be able to see you at all times through cameras. The radiotherapy machine moves around your body and it will make a slight noise. It doesn’t touch you and you won’t feel anything. You’ll need to lie very still, but the treatment only takes around 10 minutes, including the time it takes to get you into position. You should be able to go home after the treatment has finished. It’s safe for you to be around other people, including children and pregnant women, while you’re having radiotherapy. The radiation doesn’t stay in your body so you won’t give off any radiation. If you’re having radiotherapy to treat pain, it may take a week or more for your pain to improve, and it can take several weeks for the treatment to have its full effect. You may need to continue taking painkillers during this time. Pain relief usually lasts for an average of four to six months, but this can vary from person to person.

prostatecanceruk.org - Radiotherapy for advanced prostate cancer

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