Gamma Knife Users Share Latest Advances for Treating Cancer, Other Brain Disorders at Society Meeting in Greece

ATLANTA and STOCKHOLM, May 12 /PRNewswire/ -- A record 332 oral and poster presentations comprise the scientific program for Elekta's 15th International Leksell Gamma Knife® Society Meeting, which convenes May 16-20 at the Athenaeum InterContinental Hotel (Athens, Greece). The most ever submitted in the society's 21-year history, the presentations also will be posted on the Elekta website after the meeting. Attendance at the conference is estimated at 500, including neurosurgeons, radiation oncologists and other medical specialists from around the world.

A major focus of the upcoming meeting will be presentations discussing how Elekta's fifth generation Leksell Gamma Knife® Perfexion™ system is benefiting radiosurgery practices.

"After two decades in clinical practice, Gamma Knife surgery continues to be the preferred method for minimally invasive treatment of many brain disorders, particularly metastases," says Dan Leksell, MD, son of Lars Leksell and Senior Advisor at Elekta. "Leksell Gamma Knife has evolved to provide increasingly greater degrees of precision and a more streamlined workflow. At the upcoming meeting, we will hear how Leksell Gamma Knife Perfexion is helping patients, and adding new indications through the Extend™ program that weren't possible to treat before this system's introduction."

Presentations to feature clinical and Workflow advantages of Perfexion and Extend program

Leksell Gamma Knife Perfexion is a stereotactic radiosurgery system for brain and head targets that streamlines radiosurgery workflow and expands the treatable volume through an automated, multi-source collimator. Perfexion provides rapid set-up and treatment delivery to one or more tumors in a single session, and the potential to treat lesions anywhere in the head. The Extend program for Perfexion enables clinicians to treat–over two to five radiosurgery sessions–patients with larger tumors or lesions close to critical structures located in the brain, skull base and in other head/neck regions. Extend non-invasively fixes or immobilizes the patient's head, making hypofractionated Gamma Knife surgery practical for these cases.

Additional speakers will present their clinical experience using Leksell Gamma Knife to treat acoustic neuromas, benign and malignant tumors—particularly metastases—skull base lesions, AVMs and functional disorders.

Radiosurgery pioneers to be honored

The Pioneers in Radiosurgery Award will be presented to two clinicians who have made significant contributions to the advancement of radiosurgery and/or minimally invasive neurosurgery. In addition, Professor Ladislau Steiner, M.D., Ph.D., Professor of Neurosurgery and Radiology at the University of Virginia Health Sciences Center will present the Lars Leksell Lecture. Director of UVA's Gamma Knife Center, Dr. Steiner was a trusted associate of Swedish professor and neurosurgeon Lars Leksell, inventor of the radiosurgical instrument that bears his name.

About the Leksell Gamma Knife Society

The Leksell Gamma Knife Society was established in 1989 to provide a forum for Gamma Knife users to share information, experiences, clinical techniques and advanced scientific research in their quest to non-invasively treat an expanding number of brain disorders. The biennial meeting results in a large number of clinical publications, in recent years published as a supplement to Journal of Neurosurgery. The Society plays an important role in increasing the visibility and acceptance of Gamma Knife surgery in the worldwide medical community, among healthcare providers and among patients. The open sharing of results and experiences allows all Gamma Knife users to maintain leadership in the field of intracranial radiosurgery, based on the most recent clinical advancements.

About Gamma Knife surgery

Gamma Knife surgery is performed in hundreds of leading hospitals and clinics around the world. Around 50,000 patients undergo Gamma Knife surgery every year, and this unique procedure has an impressive scientific track record with thousands of peer-reviewed articles. No other non-invasive treatment method in this field has greater clinical acceptance. View recent worldwide Gamma Knife Surgery statistics.

About Elekta

Elekta is a human care company pioneering significant innovations and clinical solutions for treating cancer and brain disorders. The company develops sophisticated, state-of-the-art tools and treatment planning systems for radiation therapy and radiosurgery, as well as workflow enhancing software systems across the spectrum of cancer care.

Stretching the boundaries of science and technology, providing intelligent and resource-efficient solutions that offer confidence to both healthcare providers and patients, Elekta aims to improve, prolong and even save patient lives, making the future possible today.

Today, Elekta solutions in oncology and neurosurgery are used in over 5,000 hospitals globally, and every day more than 100,000 patients receive diagnosis, treatment or follow-up with the help of a solution from the Elekta Group.

Elekta employs around 2,500 employees globally. The corporate headquarter is located in Stockholm, Sweden, and the company is listed on the Nordic Exchange under the ticker EKTAb. For more information about Elekta, please visit www.elekta.com.

SOURCE Elekta