Breast

Our Breast Program specializes in providing state-of-the-art radiation therapy, including proton therapy, for patients with breast cancers. We treat about 750 patients with breast cancer each year, including complex presentations of this disease.

Overview Clinical trials Physicians

Our multi-disciplinary approach

We discuss all patients in several weekly multi-disciplinary team meetings. These meetings are attended by specialists from the departments of surgery, radiology, medical oncology, radiotherapy, pathology, plastic surgery and clinical genetics. For each patient, the teams determine the best treatment approach and they initiate any additional actions necessary prior to the start of treatment. Our cross-specialty approach enables us to provide comprehensive care tailored to your needs.

We offer the most modern radiotherapy treatment techniques such as IMRT and VMAT. We closely monitor the geometry and location of the tumor and surrounding healthy tissues by means of the most advanced imaging systems, such as cone-beam CT and surface imaging. When indicated, we apply active breathing control (ABC) to further reduce the dose to the heart.

You can find more information about our treatment techniques here.

Proton therapy

As of February 2019 we offer proton therapy for the treatment of breast cancer. For nearly all breast cancer patients referred to our department we perform a planning comparison study between the most advanced photon and proton therapy treatment plans. Both treatment plans are translated into a probability of developing radiation-induced side-effects. Based on these results, and on national indication protocols, we determine the radiotherapy technique most suitable for your treatment. You will be treated with photon therapy, should the application of proton therapy provide little or no benefit.

Follow-up program

We systematically monitor and record each patients’ side-effects, quality of life and treatment outcome in our Standardized Follow-Up-program. We use these data in our continuous research towards the development of predictive models for radiation-induced side-effects. Models to predict radiation damage to the heart and lungs, and the induction of secondary tumors, can be used in the selection of the optimal treatment technique.

Our physicians are actively involved in the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) and the Dutch Breast Cancer Research Group (BOOG).

Our department currently participates in the following clinical trials and research studies:

EMIRA study (Inclusion of patients is closed)
Research into early changes in the heart after radiation and chemotherapy for breast cancer.

MEDIRAD study (Inclusion of patients is closed)
This study aims to better understand and evaluate the health effects of low-dose ionizing radiation exposure from diagnostic and therapeutic imaging, and from off-target effects in radiotherapy.

EARLY-HEART study (Inclusion of patients is closed)
This study aims to identify and validate the most important cardiac imaging and circulating biomarkers of radiation-induced cardiovascular changes arising in the first 2 years after the radiation therapy of breast cancer. In addition to standard follow-up, patients will need to give repeated blood samples and will undergo repeated cardiac imaging.