C-RAD AB out of Uppsala, Sweden received FDA clearance for its futuristic looking Catalyst system. The device is attached to the ceiling in a radiation therapy suite and optically monitors body movements and breathing of patients on the table for positioning, motion control and respiratory gating of the beam.
It displays various parameters right on the patient’s body and integrates with the other equipment to provide warnings and send hold signals to the radiation beam as necessary.
Radiation therapy is a complex process, where many pieces of equipment, in many cases from different vendors, need to work together during the different steps of the treatment chain. The Catalyst™ provides automatic and independent verification of many critical parameters that were previously only possible to check manually. The Catalyst™ thus reinforces the treatment chain.
Requiring minimal user interaction, the Catalyst™ acts as an always present decision support system where the required information is projected directly on the couch or patient. The system’s high performance provides immediate and real-time feedback, which means that the therapist can keep focusing on ensuring the best possible patient comfort and treatment outcome.
The Catalyst™ software is built from the ground up for a networked environment. Tight integration with other systems in the clinic ensures a smooth work-flow where data is transferred automatically via industry standard or vendor specific interfaces. When the patient is selected in the R&V system, the same patient is automatically selected in the Catalyst™, and computed shifts can in most cases also be applied automatically. The central patient database ensures that the correct settings are always available even in cases where the patient needs to be treated in a different room.
Press release: FDA approval of the C-RAD Catalyst system
Product page: Catalyst system…
