Radiation dose..?

Make sure the same techs are giving you your rads...They let a new tech, that I questioned as to her experience before I let her give me rad, I was assured she new what she was doing.....She did it wrong!!!...I almost jumped off the table (did not realize the table rises about 4' during rads), I yelled for her to stop!!...and then demanded my rad doc and they admitted she did it wrong, but of course they said that it was not enough of a difference to cause my any concern.....Right!!!..it's not their body on the table and having been through what we have been through and some of the attitudes of some docs, I say question anything that doesn't feel right!!...Ask for explaination today...Take nothing for granted!!!!!!

I'm on my 4th round of radiation; chest wall in 2004, both hips and pelvis in 2007, left hip joint in Nov/Dec 2009, and now radiation to the spine. Each time, they always take 1 or 2 xrays once per week; it's not to see if the treatment is working, just to make sure everything is still lined up as it should be.

The usual radiation dose for whole breast irradiation given as IMRT is 180 cGy each day, and most people get 28 fractions, for a total of 5040 cGy, for whole boost radiation, and the boost is electrons, given over 3-5 days for another 900-100 cGy.

The fraction should be the same each day for each photon session and each electron boost session.

I'm in agreement with Jo that the machines are in a controlled environment: I watch the techs where I work, and they are very careful in the set-up and I'll have to ask them why it would take longer one day.

When I got rads, it was the same amount of time each day--although the boost was delivered in this room I called "the gulag"--the door slammed shut and it was clearly an older space.

Weird to have gotten it, and work in the business...

Here's a link to Gray and what it means--it's a radiation dose

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_%28unit%29 

Kira 

leighannmarie

My boost is from the same machine as the full treatment. When I was having the full treatment I had two blasts per side. The rad onc told me that one was at a different depth to the other to avoid skin problems. I could hear the machine altering something in between. 3 blasts per side would be for the same thing I guess, depending on the shape of your breast.

As for the length of time...I was told that my boost is for a longer time because, altho it is the same dose as the full breast treatment, there is a filter that reduces the dose so that it needs to be done for longer. This is to reduce the reaction to the skin. I had this longer, filtered blast on my neck nodes where the skin is thinner than the breast and you can hardly see where it was done. I have a red patch on my back tho where it came out...can't win!

Good Luck with the rest of your treatment.

Macc

leighannmarie, my rads were done on the Trilogy Radiation System, supposedly a state of the art newer system, where I would lay with arms over head in a personal body form...Then I would have 2 short set up rads and then 2 long about 20 seconds rads while holding my breath each rad (machine would move around me)...I was told this would spare my heart and lungs to a lesser degree...since my lump was on my left side....After the new tech assured me that she new my treatment plan, she just zapped me about 4 short times and then one really long one without telling me to hold my breath as they usually did with each rad of mine....I just screamed that she did not know what she was doing and even my Rad doc said she had not understood (even though they assured me 100%), I should have went with my gut and not let her do it...She was never allowed anywhere in my site for my last 20 visits after that....I had 2 grays a day with one on each side and the last 5 boosts being 2 grays which were divided up into 4 shorter rads just over my surgery area only.....Get to know your routine every day so you can ask when things are different from the day before....

It sounds like you are on top of the situation and handling it well.  The treatment machines have a record and verify system, so the doc doublechecking should make it a sure thing.