Category: Treatment

The UAB Department of Radiation Oncology has launched its new TrueBeam advanced radiotherapy system at UAB Medicine’s Kirklin Clinic at Acton Road. TrueBeam is Varian Medical Systems Inc.’s top-of-the-line radiotherapy technology, which can be used to treat tumors anywhere in the body where radiation treatment is indicated.

Certain cancer treatments can damage the heart and the cardiovascular system. The cardio-oncology clinic at the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center at Acton Road is addressing that problem. The clinic offers comprehensive testing and specialized care to protect cancer patients undergoing therapies that can affect cardiovascular function.

Instead of traditional X-ray radiation, the new facility uses protons to better target cancer cells while minimizing the impact on healthy surrounding tissue and organs. As one of only 35 proton therapy centers in the United States and the first in Alabama, it will greatly reduce the travel burden for many patients and provide convenience to those who may need additional care at UAB Medicine.

The University of Alabama at Birmingham has been designated a Center of Excellence by the American Initiative in Mast Cell Diseases Network. Mast cells are produced in the bone marrow and are an important part of the immune system. Mast cell diseases, such as mastocytosis, occur from an overabundance or overactivity of mast cells in the bone marrow and other organs.

A cancer analysis web portal at the University of Alabama at Birmingham is serving cancer clinicians and researchers across the world in their search for cancer biomarkers, therapeutic target discovery and precision treatments to help patients.

Though lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death in the nation, physicians at the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Alabama at Birmingham want patients to know about the advancements in diagnostic technologies and therapies, as well as new screening guidelines, which provide more hope for lung cancer patients than ever before.

Physicians at the University of Alabama at Birmingham Marnix E. Heersink School of Medicine’s Department of Radiation Oncology recently began providing stereotactic body radiation therapy, or SBRT, to lung cancer patients at UAB Medicine’s Russell Medical Cancer Center in Alexander City, Alabama.

Mothers delivering newborns at the University of Alabama at Birmingham now can donate their newborn’s umbilical cord blood to LifeSouth Cord Blood Bank, a public FDA-licensed cord blood bank of LifeSouth Community Blood Centers. Donating cord blood is painless for mother and baby, and there is no charge for the lifesaving service.

The University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Department of Radiology is utilizing a special technology to help with tumor ablation therapy called the NanoKnife.  

The University of Alabama at Birmingham has been identified by Emerging Therapy Solutions as a “Program of Experience” for Chimeric antigen receptor T cell therapy.

For many patients, a stage 4 cancer diagnosis can be crippling. Though stage 4 diagnoses look different based on the type of cancer, across the board, treatment options are generally limited and the road to potential recovery looks daunting.

Physicians with UAB Medicine, O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center and the University of Alabama at Birmingham Heersink School of Medicine, have launched a new Hepatic Artery Infusion Pump Program — the only program of its type in Alabama — to offer more treatment options to patients with colon or rectal cancer that has spread to the liver.

Proton International at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, the first proton therapy center in Alabama, has treated its 300th patient. The center, a partnership between Proton International and UAB, performed its first treatment March 11, 2020. It is one of only 38 proton therapy centers in the United States. 

When faced with anorectal melanoma, an uncommon and aggressive form of cancer, Meredith McGowan turned to the University of Alabama at Birmingham for cross-specialty, cutting-edge treatment in order to get back to her active lifestyle.

After 18 months of excruciating migraines, Birmingham-area businessman Christopher Sheheane felt as though he was at the end of his rope. With the migraines came the inability to think clearly, to lead his company, and to be the father and husband he wanted to be.  

In December 2020, the Division of Hematology and Oncology began offering High-Dose-Ara-C (HiDAC) through the UAB Extended Care Clinic, an outpatient chemotherapy service that eliminates the need for patients to be admitted to the hospital for treatment.

Rehabilitation therapy helps people recover from many medical conditions, such as stroke, heart attack, and injury. Rehab for patients with cancer is equally valuable, but it isn’t often used in the United States. The new Cancer Rehabilitation Program, developed by physicians in the UAB Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, seeks to change that at UAB Medicine.

UAB will launch the Pat and Jean Sullivan Comprehensive Head and Neck Cancer Survivor Care Program in 2020 — the first effort of its kind in the country.

It took four months of detective work, but physicians at the University of Alabama at Birmingham found the rare cause of a woman’s medical issues. UAB’s joint pituitary disorders clinic, featuring the unusual combination of endocrinology and neurosurgery, identified and removed a pituitary tumor from Debra Nelson that had gone undiagnosed for more than six years.  

UAB offers CAR T-cell therapy, a new treatment that adapts a patient’s own immune system to fight cancer.

The University of Alabama at Birmingham has established the first multidisciplinary program in the state to treat diseases of the pancreas and bile ducts with the creation of the Pancreatobiliary Disease Center within the School of Medicine.

When doctors found that 46-year-old Hayden Olds of Fairhope, Alabama, had a low-risk lesion on his prostate, Olds says he was caught off guard because he had not experienced any symptoms and was younger than the typical prostate cancer patient. To ensure he made the right decision moving forward, he chose to come to the University of Alabama at Birmingham.