Rare brain tumor: teen among the first to receive proton-beam therapy

In October 2018, a 15-year-old boy named Mason Kettley was diagnosed with a rare brain tumor termed, pilomyxoid astrocytoma. Fast forward 3 months later to 23 January 2019, Mason becomes one of the first UK patients to receive proton-beam therapy (PBT) at the NHS’s new PBT Center at The Christie Hospital (Manchester, UK). PBT is a specialist form of radiotherapy that targets cancer very precisely, increasing success rates and reducing side effects, which makes it an ideal treatment for certain cancers in children who are at risk of lasting damage to organs that are still growing. Previously, in 2014, PBT...