Sequoia New Linear Accelerator

The Sequoia Hospital Foundation is pleased to announce the arrival of the new Varian TrueBeam™ Radiotherapy Linear Accelerator System for the treatment of cancer.  Sequoia Hospital’s new $1.99 million linear accelerator was funded entirely by the Foundation, thanks in part to a generous $500,000 grant from the non-profit HEDCO Foundation.  The remainder of the funding came from individual community donations.

Varian’s TrueBeam™ Radiotherapy Linear Accelerator System will bring Sequoia Hospital to the leading edge of cancer care. TrueBeam treats cancer anywhere in the body where radiation treatment is indicated, including lung, breast, prostate, head and neck. The system can deliver gated RapidArc® radiotherapy, making it possible to monitor patient breathing and compensate for tumor motion while quickly delivering the required treatment dose during a continuous rotation around the patient. This development enables the use of RapidArc to target many types of cancers including lung tumors, for example, with greater precision by "gating" the beam (turning it on and off) in response to tumor motion.

The Varian system is currently being installed in Sequoia Hospital’s Radiation Oncology Department, after which it will be subject to state licensing and approval.  Upon completion of that process, Sequoia looks forward to beginning the treatment of patients with this new equipment beginning in mid-March of 2017.