SYDNEY – Macquarie University Hospital performed Australia's first Gamma Knife surgery with its new Leksell Gamma Knife Perfexion system on Aug. 3, making it the country's first center capable of providing dedicated intracranial radiosurgery.

MUH and the Australian School of Advanced Medicine (ASAM) partnered with Genesis Care, an Australia-based provider of cancer management services, to procure the system, which is located in Genesis Care's radiation therapy department at MUH.

Gamma Knife radiosurgery was designed as more patient friendly alternative to traditional brain surgery for illnesses such as metastatic disease. The system delivers up to thousands of low-intensity radiation beams to one or more targets in a single session. Perfexion, the latest version of the Gamma Knife model, is expected to provide improved speed and ease of use than it's predecessors.

"Patient protection is significantly better with Gamma Knife compared with other radiosurgery units, such as CyberKnife or linear accelerator-based systems, which - while targeting brain lesions - also expose the patient to a substantial extracranial dose," said John Fuller, neurosurgeon and Gamma Knife program co-director at MUH.

MUH's first radiosurgery patient was a 33-year-old man with multiple small brain tumors, said Fuller. "He was awake during the whole procedure and received only a local anesthetic. The gentleness of Gamma Knife surgery not only benefits patients, but also extends to their families, our treatment team and the healthcare system as a whole."