Six Treatments in !!

Sunday 23rd December and I have just returned home after my 6th treatment. The reason I had a treatment this Sunday is to balance out the missing treatment on Christmas Day. I also have a treatment on Saturday 29th December to cover for Boxing Day, and also Saturday 5th January for New Years Day.

Interestingly I was talking to one of the Radiographers yesterday, and my treatment this time is different from the Radiotherapy treatment that I had prior to my first tumour operation last year. The treatment last year was pre operation and the machine doing the treatment used electrons as the X-ray beam. This time my treatment is post operation and I am being treated with a Photon beam. The photons are generated by the electron beam being fired at a tungsten target within the machine, this causes the electrons to dissipate their energy as photons. The photons, which scatter in all directions, are then re-focused into the beam which is then directed at my leg. All this is happening at close to the speed of light (186,000 miles per second) which for us mere mortals is somewhat difficult to comprehend. But it works !!

This a picture of the actual machine, also you can see the treatment table bottom left. This is almost identical to the machine I was on last year. A little worrying to see the workman's step ladder against the back wall, but I guess these are needed to do maintenance on the upper parts of the machine, gives you an idea of the size of the machine.

By December 31st I will have completed 11 treatments, so 1/3rd of the way through. My final treatment will be on Wednesday 30th January 2013.