Review: Adaptive Radiation Therapy for Head and Neck Cancer

TL;DR

This review discusses the emerging role of adaptive radiation therapy (ART) in head and neck cancer, emphasizing technological advances, interdisciplinary collaboration, and the need for rigorous testing to ensure safe and effective implementation.

Contribution

It highlights recent technological innovations and advocates for collaborative efforts to overcome barriers in deploying ART for head and neck cancer.

Findings

Emerging biomarkers and devices enable real-time adaptation.

Interdisciplinary collaboration is crucial for safe ART deployment.

Rigorous testing and quality assurance are essential before clinical use.

Abstract

The future of ART in head and neck cancer is just beginning. Novel technologies have pushed the boundary of what is possible in terms of techniques to identify biomarkers for adaptation as well as innovative devices specialized to respond to these adaptations, sometimes in real-time. Important interdisciplinary steps must be taken moving forward to ensure the safe deployment of these new techniques, such as rigorous quality assurance evaluations from medical physicists, clinical trials from physicians, and comprehensive testing from vendors prior to release. In summary, we aimed not to provide a single correct answer for the optimal implementation of ART in the era of imaging biomarkers, but to encourage the field to collaborate and bring each idea discussed here together to overcome current barriers and deliver the best treatment possible to the patient.