1 00:00:02,290 --> 00:00:06,839 My name is Paul Read and I'm a professor in Radiation Oncology and I'm fortunate to serve 2 00:00:06,839 --> 00:00:11,469 as the Medical Director and the Vice Chair of our department here in the Emily Couric 3 00:00:11,469 --> 00:00:20,250 Cancer Center. Cancer affects the family, it affects the community even. My father had died of cancer as well 4 00:00:20,750 --> 00:00:25,000 I remember sitting in waiting rooms, and you know, you want to do other things, you want to be home, you want to be with your family, 5 00:00:25,000 --> 00:00:29,520 and you want to get pain relief quickly. We need to refocus our effort, 6 00:00:29,520 --> 00:00:37,590 not to treat the cancer but to treat the patient and to support the patient. Back in 2003, we 7 00:00:37,590 --> 00:00:42,000 were awarded a grant to build a program where we could use the tomotherapy system to 8 00:00:42,000 --> 00:00:47,410 deliver very high doses of radiation to patients to very small volumes and about 9 00:00:47,410 --> 00:00:51,740 three to four years later we started thinking, maybe we can do this in a way 10 00:00:51,740 --> 00:00:58,160 that patients could come and have this done in a single day. And so our goal is to 11 00:00:58,160 --> 00:01:02,640 get patients treated quickly. In this program, patients have pain relief 12 00:01:02,640 --> 00:01:07,760 really within the first week where as in the prior workflow, you weren't even part way through your 13 00:01:07,760 --> 00:01:11,080 treatment yet. Every minute counts when you only 14 00:01:11,080 --> 00:01:16,040 have a few months left to live. We've been very fortunate at the University of Virginia 15 00:01:16,040 --> 00:01:21,860 that the Administration, the Medical Center, and the Medical School have been very supportive of us pioneering 16 00:01:21,860 --> 00:01:28,000 treatments that aren't focused on revenue, but on the patient's quality of life and outcome and convenience. 17 00:01:28,000 --> 00:01:35,850 There's something called the standard of care. Well the standard of care's not good enough. We want to be on 18 00:01:35,850 --> 00:01:40,720 that cutting edge. We have to do better, we always have to try to improve it. Thomas Jefferson would say that.