Palliative Radiotherapy

This chapter discusses the principles and practices of palliative radiotherapy, emphasizing its primary goal of symptom relief for patients with advanced disease. It highlights the importance of efficiency and simplicity in treatment planning and delivery, contrasting it with the more complex approaches used in curative radiotherapy. The chapter covers patient assessment, focusing on understanding the clinical background and goals of care, and the necessity of reviewing previous radiotherapy treatments. It discusses patient setup, emphasizing for minimal use of immobilization devices to improve efficiency and support patient comfort, especially for those in pain or with limited mobility. Techniques such as 2D and 3D conformal radiotherapy are explored, with a focus on balancing target coverage, dose conformality, and treatment efficiency. The chapter concludes with a discussion on plan robustness, emphasizing the need for adaptable strategies to accommodate anatomical change and minimize the delays caused by re-planning.