[How to enhance the efficacy of radiotherapy]

Radiation therapy is one of the most effective treatment for cancer patients. Many developments in radiotherapy have resulted from new technologies or have been made empirically by clinicians. Radiobiology, which provides a conceptual basis for radiotherapy, identifying mechanisms and processes that underlie the response of tumors and normal tissues to irradiation, is the best research way to enhance the therapeutic index of radiation therapy. Raising the standards of radiation dose using multiple fractions per day, treating patients with accelerated radiotherapy to reduce the effect of tumor-cell repopulation during treatment, overcoming hypoxic cell radioresistance, using biological response modifiers, combining radiation and chemotherapy are principal ways to enhance radiation results. Some of them are now in the clinical practice, other are still under evaluation.