Brachytherapy is a type of radiotherapy treatment in which small sealed amounts of radiation are placed inside your body to treat your cancer.
Sometimes this type of treatment is given in isolation, or can be used in combination with external beam radiotherapy or chemotherapy. Each treatment is personalised for every patient and their tumour. Your treatment will be unique to you.
Brachytherapy is mainly used to treat prostate and gynaecological cancers. It may also be used to treat some oesophageal, rectal and skin cancers as well.
In the video below, Dr Rachel Cooper, one of our clinical oncologists, explains the principles about brachytherapy.
Rachel Cooper about Brachytherapy
Brachytherapy is a type of internal radiation treatment where we place radioactive sources inside the cancer. Unlike external beam radiotherapy, where the radiotherapy comes from outside the body, brachytherapy delivers radiation from inside the tumor to the outside. This allows us to administer a very high dose of radiotherapy over a short distance, treating the cancer while sparing the surrounding normal tissue.
Brachytherapy can either be a permanent or temporary implant. Permanent implants, for example, are most commonly used in prostate brachytherapy. Temporary implants are more commonly used in gynecological cancers.
Brachytherapy can be used to treat various cancers, including gynecological cancers like cervical cancer, endometrial cancer, vulvar, or vaginal cancer, with cervical cancer being the most common. It can also treat prostate cancer, which is one of the most common areas for its use. Additionally, brachytherapy is increasingly used to treat other cancers, such as breast cancer, rectal cancer, anal cancer, esophageal cancer, head and neck cancers, skin cancers, and sometimes cancers around the eye.
The advantages of brachytherapy include that it is often done in a relatively short period of time. It can be targeted precisely to the cancer, which allows us to deliver a high dose of radiotherapy directly to the tumor. This targeted approach also means that we can limit the dose to surrounding structures compared to external beam radiotherapy. The toxicity associated with brachytherapy is often less than that of external beam radiotherapy or surgery, which may be the other alternatives.
However, one disadvantage is that many patients do not fully understand brachytherapy, which can cause apprehension or fear. Once they undergo the treatment, they often realize that it is less difficult than many other treatments. The challenge lies in overcoming their initial fear and apprehension.
If a patient wants to learn more about brachytherapy, I would suggest they speak with their treating oncologist. The oncologist can help determine if brachytherapy is an option for their treatment, either in combination with surgery or external beam radiotherapy, or as an alternative treatment. Unfortunately, brachytherapy may not be appropriate for every patient, but by asking the question, it allows the clinician to consider it and discuss with colleagues whether it is a suitable option.
The brachytherapy department works as a multi-disciplinary team (MDT) which means that different health professionals work together to share specialist knowledge and expertise to make sure that all patients have the best possible treatment and care available. You may not meet all of the team as some work behind the scenes looking after our equipment or planning your treatment.
Our team is made up of:
- Clinical oncologists
- Radiologists
- Therapy radiographers
- Anaesthetists
- Theatre nurses
- Operating department practitioners
- Physicists
- Clinical scientific technologists
- Porters
- Treatment coordinators & booking clerks
Most of our staff wear theatre scrubs so sometimes it may be difficult identifying who they are. Every member of our staff will introduce themselves and have a Leeds Teaching Hospitals ID card and wear a name badge.
There may be some waiting time between the stages of your treatment so please feel free to bring a book, tablet or phone with you. There is free hospital WIFI available for patients and visitors.
Contact us
Brachytherapy is situated in the Bexley Wing at St James’s Hospital. Ask at Bexley Wing reception for directions to The Rutherford Brachytherapy Suite.
0113 206 7808 – General Brachytherapy enquiries
0113 206 7712 – Brachytherapy Advanced Practitioners
Accessibility Guide
The Trust’s accessibility guides, created by AccessAble, are a great way to help you navigate our sites. You can use them to find accessibility information, including details about car parking, lifts, toilets, main entrances, hearing loops, and much more.
View the Brachytherapy and Rutherford Suite Accessibility GuideCervical brachytherapy
Cervical cancer brachytherapy is usually performed as a day case. You will be in the hospital for most of the day when you are having your brachytherapy treatment. You may want to bring a book or magazines with you.
The brachytherapy team looking after you will explain your treatment and possible side effects to you in detail. If you do not understand any words or phrases, please ask a member of the team. It does not matter how many times you ask your questions.
Treatment is normally given over three appointments on three consecutive weeks. You will need to come to the hospital early in the morning as we do the planning and treatment all in the same day.
The brachytherapy treatment is delivered through tubes called applicators. The applicator is inserted into your vagina in our dedicated brachytherapy theatre. You will have an epidural anaesthetic injection before this happens so that you cannot feel the procedure. After the applicator is in place, you will have either a computerised tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance (MR) scan. This allows us to take images of your cancer so that we can plan your treatment accurately.
There is a wait of two to three hours between the scan and the treatment whilst the physicists, oncologists and dosimetrists plan your individualised brachytherapy treatment.
The treatment takes approximately 10 minutes. You will be alone in the room when you are having the treatment, but the radiographers can see and hear you at all times. We have a radio and CD player in the room so you can listen to music if you want to. Please feel free to bring a CD to listen to.
Once the treatment is finished, the applicators are removed. No radiation source is left inside your body. You can go home once you have had something to eat and drink, and the effects of the epidural have worn off.
Please note
You cannot drive for 24 hours after the procedure so someone will need to collect you from the department.
Prostate brachytherapy
There are two different types of prostate brachytherapy that are offered at Leeds Cancer Centre:
- High Dose Rate (HDR) temporary brachytherapy implants
- Low Dose Rate (LDR) permanent seed brachytherapy
The type of treatment you will receive depends on the size of your prostate, the stage of your cancer, your Gleason score and PSA level. Not everyone is suitable to have brachytherapy. Brachytherapy can be given in isolation or with external beam radiotherapy. Your doctor will let you know if you can have brachytherapy and if so which type would be more suitable for your type of cancer.
Patients undergoing prostate brachytherapy may need to stay in the hospital for a night following the treatment. If this applies to, your doctor will let you know before the day of the treatment.
You will have either a general anaesthetic or spinal epidural for your brachytherapy treatment and will feel nothing during the procedure.
High Dose Rate (HDR) temporary brachytherapy implants
HDR prostate brachytherapy is a technique to treat prostate cancer using a radiation source that is temporarily inserted into your prostate. You will be admitted to the hospital for your treatment. You will stay in the hospital for the day of the treatment and overnight until the next day.
The brachytherapy is delivered to you after you have had a general anaesthetic. When you are under the general anaesthetic, thin tubes are inserted into your prostate gland. An individualised treatment plan is made using ultrasound scans to determine the radiation dose required to treat your cancer. When the tubes are in the correct position, they are connected to a machine which will deliver the radiation to your cancer. The treatment normally takes about 20 minutes to deliver. When the treatment has been completed, the tubes are disconnected from the machine and then removed from your prostate. No radiation is left inside your body.
When you come around from the anaesthetic, you will be taken back to your ward.
Low Dose Rate (LDR) permanent seed brachytherapy
LDR brachytherapy is a technique to treat prostate cancer using a low dose rate source of radiation that is inserted into your prostate and left there. LDR treatments are normally performed in the morning as a day case. Your brachytherapy team will give you detailed information about your appointment time.
Each radiation source is very small, about the size of a grain of rice. The seeds stay in your prostate giving your cancer the required dose of radiation over a period of months. The radiation only treats your prostate cancer and does not have any effect on the rest of your body. The seeds release most of their radiation over the first few months after being inserted.
Please note
If you have had a prostate LDR treatment, you cannot drive for 24 hours. You will also need an escort to take you home.
If you have had LDR brachytherapy, you will be slightly radioactive. You must follow instructions relating to holding children, being close to pregnant women and having unprotected sex following the insertion of the seeds. Your brachytherapy team will give you detailed information and advice.