What is TARGIT
There is a great variety in patients, with a corresponding need for differing treatment strategies tailored to meet an individual patient's characteristics. Such an individualized approach is already being achieved in surgical treatment, with the use of lumpectomy and sentinel node biopsy instead of more radical procedures.
TARGIT is an acronym for (TARGeted Intraoperative radioTherapy). TARGIT is a technique of giving radiotherapy to the tissues surrounding a cancer (tumour bed) after its surgical removal. The technique was designed in 1998 at the University College London by Jayant S Vaidya and Michael Baum along with Jeffrey Tobias. One can say that TARGIT is a special method of intraoperative radiotherapy (IORT).
The TARGIT-A trial is a randomized controlled clinical trial that is testing whether TARGIT is either equivalent or superior to conventional course of external beam postoperative radiotherapy for breast cancer which is normally given to the whole breast over a course of several weeks.
Targeting radiotherapy to the tumor bed means it can be delivered accurately, at the time of surgery, does not delay adjuvant chemotherapy, and could allow breast conserving surgery (rather than mastectomy) when the 5 or 6-week course of postoperative radiotherapy is not desirable or practical. The technique is currently undergoing a multinational clinical trial in comparison with conventional external beam radiotherapy.
History, scientific publications and papers, presentations, operative videos are available at the TARGIT Trial and results website
Targeted Intraoperative Radiotherapy
Immediately after tumor removal, radiation is applied by means of a spherical applicator that is surgically placed in the tumour bed so ensuring accurate distribution of radiation dose to the targeted breast tissue that needs treatment.