Two years ago, Daniel Robbins was diagnosed with the most serious type of cancer he could get. Considered to be Stage 4, Robbins has a tumor in his neck, spots on his chest and the cancer wrapped around his heart, esophagus and liver.

He was given no chance for survival.

"He used to be considered untreatable," said Dr. Eric Rost, medical director of radiation oncology at Renown Regional Medical Center's Institute of Cancer.

But with TomoTherapy, Robbins, a 50-year-old Sparks resident, has excellent chances of enjoying a prolonged life with his family without experiencing the normal side effects of radiation or chemotherapy.

Specialists at Renown treated their first patients with complex cases, such as multiple tumors, last Thursday with the new cancer radiation service. Renown Health is the first in the region to offer this new advanced technology that increases doctors' abilities to accurately treat their patients with minimal damage to surrounding healthy tissues.

TomoTherapy offers a more precise delivery of radiation to cancer cells and lesions in the body. Using a Hi-Art machine, patients lie down on a bed and are moved into a huge machine with a computed tomography (CT) scanner, as if they were having an MRI. Images of the patient's internal organs are sent to a computer that technicians use to locate and size up the cancerous areas. The patient also receives their prescribed dose of radiation in thousands of beamlets in a 360-degree helical pattern around the tumor.

The procedure can take as little as 10 minutes, but it could last longer depending on the severity of the cancer.

Before going in for a treatment on Tuesday, Robbins said nothing else was effective for him because his cancer was so advanced.

"I've been going through this cancer for two years," Robbins said. "I had a tumor taken out of my neck and two muscles cut and extra radiation on my neck, which was very painful. It burned me hard. I had second-degree burns on my neck and face."

After about a year, Robbins complained of pain in his chest. An X-ray revealed spots on his lungs and then the "harsh treatment" of chemotherapy and radiation began. Six doses in eight months were unsuccessful as Robbins' blood platelets began to fail and eventually caused a blood clot. The cancer had spread to his brain.

Rost said the first round of radiation didn't work because it was hurried and done without regard to providing Robbins with comfort for the pain.

Several more attempts with chemotherapy, as much as Robbins could tolerate, also didn't help. At that point, most people would have given up, but Rost finally suggested TomoTherapy, and it's working.

Rost called TomoTherapy a finer surgical tool that helps prevent fewer side effects because the radiation is focused only on the affected area.

"In the old days, you'd treat the area like a square block," Rost said.

For example, without the precision of TomoTherapy, a patient who had prostate cancer a few years ago might have had a dose of radiation treatment targeted to the prostate, but also affecting the bladder and rectum. As a result, the patient would have suffered a burning sensation while urinating, incontinence and impotence, Rost said.

All that is eliminated with the new technology, but that doesn't render other cancer treatments as ineffective or unnecessary.

"(Other treatments) are not going to go away," Rost said. "With chemotherapy, we keep looking for a magic drug that will kill just the tumor cells but not the cancer cells. ... By using a little bit of all (types of cancer treatment), we keep the patient healthy overall and we get the best results by leaving away side effects — or most of them — so that's how this treatment changes the entire spectrum of cancer treatment.”

TomoTherapy can, however, work with all cancer patients in all stages, he said, but taken on an individual basis, doctors must determine based on previous treatment, condition, type and size of cancer whether the patient needs surgery, chemotherapy, radiation or any combination thereof and in which order.

Radiation is often a treatment of choice for tumors and lesions because nothing is resistant to it, Rost said.

Rost said he didn't know the exact cost of the procedure, but that all types of insurance cover it.

"Everything is expensive, but this machine is no more expensive than any other type of accelerator," he said.

For Robbins, the new radiation treatment has helped him to breathe a little better. He will have to come in every work day for six weeks for treatment — and it's giving him hope.

"They didn't give me very much of a chance of living and it was devastating to me and my family," Robbins said. "... We were directed to Dr. Rost and he's made a miracle happen. The tumors in my brain are non-malignant. My lungs are in bad shape and he says, 'I'll take care of you.' "