LungBlog

Drew Stephansen, 68, of Brookfield, worked in construction until he retired in August after his third round of chemotherapy for late-stage lung cancer.

Doctors found in April that the cancer had metastasized to his brain. Like the tumor in his lung, it was inoperable with conventional surgery, but doctors decided to use CyberKnife.

“It was not like any hospital experience I ever had,” said Stephansen, one of the first patients at the CyberKnife Center. “There was no physical invasion. It basically cut out the tumor by radiation.”

A single hour-longCyberKnife procedure did what eight rounds of chemotherapy could not – it shrunk the tumor in his brain, he said.

“You can look at the X-rays and see the difference yourself,” Stephansen said.

Because it is wrapped around his bronchial tube, the tumor in his lung is not a candidate for radiosurgery, he said, but at least the brain tumor is “one less thing I’m going to die from.”