Proton beam therapy: a promising method of locoregional cancer control.

Proton beams offer superior characteristics for clinical radiation therapy, including the capability to localize precisely the dose to the desired target volume. Such precision enables the radiation therapist to give higher doses to the tumor while avoiding intolerable doses to adjacent normal tissues. Locoregional control is thus increased, and treatment morbidity and side effects are decreased. When it opens in late spring 1990, Loma Linda University Medical Center's proton treatment facility will feature the world's first accelerator and proton therapy system designed for patient care. During the next decade, other similarly-designed proton therapy systems will be built in Canada, England, France, Belgium, Germany, Japan, and South Africa, as well as at Massachusetts General Hospital in the United States.