Ethos™ Adaptive Intelligence™ Therapy by Varian
Ethos™ Adaptive Intelligence™ Therapy by Varian
Western Radiation Oncology (WRO) proudly offers Ethos™ Adaptive Radiation Therapy — an advanced, AI-driven cancer treatment platform developed by Varian. As the first hospital on the West Coast to adopt this technology, El Camino Hospital is leading the way in delivering personalized, real-time radiation therapy for even the most complex cancer cases.
What Is Adaptive Radiation Therapy?
Adaptive radiation therapy is a type of cancer treatment that uses advanced imaging and computer software to adjust the radiation plan in real time, based on how a patient’s body or tumor changes during the course of treatment. These adjustments can happen daily, ensuring that radiation is delivered more precisely to the tumor while avoiding healthy tissue.
Why Adaptive Radiation Therapy Is Used for Advanced Cancers?
Adaptive therapy adds more personalization to treatment plans, showing promise for difficult cancers or advanced stage cancers that cannot normally be treated with surgery or conventional radiation therapy.
Adaptive radiation therapy is especially useful in some patients where changes in anatomy, proximity to critical normal organs, or tumor shrinkage requires more precise targeting.
Why Ethos™ Adaptive Therapy Is Different
Traditional methods of adaptive therapy involved a patient undergoing a new treatment planning session with days spent outlining changes in anatomy and creating new treatment plans. Ethos™ was created to address the shortcomings found in traditional adaptive therapy.
How Ethos™ Adaptive Radiation Therapy Works
Ethos™ therapy, a Varian Adaptive Intelligence™ creates contours and generates adapted plans for physician review within minutes, while a patient is on the treatment couch. It allows doctors to:
- Access diagnostic quality MR, PET and CT images during planning and treatment
- View daily changes in patient anatomy at the console with high quality iCBCT images
- Optimize visualization of large target volumes
- Gain insight through the advanced power of AI-enhanced image segmentation and AI-driven treatment planning
- Apply automated dose accumulation and forecasting to monitor treatment progress
- Harness relevant knowledge to monitor and forecast dose accumulation
Online adaptive therapy is no longer an elusive aspiration—too complex and time-consuming to be practical and too exclusive for most clinics and patients. True to the Ethos name, this revolutionary therapy is within reach now for cancer patients everywhere.
Potential benefits of Adaptive Radiation Therapy for Cancer Care
Transformative technologies help enhance clinical workflow
- Template-driven prescription creation of physician’s objectives and intent
- Designed to optimize the generation of interactive 3D prescriptions
- Using templates allows clinicians to create many goals within seconds, such as target dose and OAR constraints
Easily integrate multi-modality images at any stage
- Leverage diagnostic MR, PET, and CT images during planning and treatment
- Atlas and geometry-based algorithms contour selected anatomy automatically
- Manual drag-and-drop tools are also available for further review and fast edits in real-time
New interactive dose optimizer—powered by GPU
- Dose preview allows for evaluation of trade-offs in organ sparing and target dose coverage
- Using GPU for dose calculation and optimization, AI-driven IMRT and VMAT plans are auto-generated
- Plans are compared against physician’s intent using metrics to streamline the comparisons
Want to dive deeper into the science behind Ethos™?
Visit Varian’s official Ethos™ page to learn more about the technology — or book a consultation with a WRO specialist to see if this treatment is right for you.
© 1999-2022 Varian Medical Systems, Inc. All Rights reserved.
FAQs
Ethos™ is an advanced radiation therapy platform developed by Varian that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to adapt your treatment plan daily based on changes in your body, such as tumor shrinkage or organ movement. This allows for more precise and personalized cancer treatment
Ethos™ is particularly beneficial for cancers where the tumor or surrounding anatomy may shift between treatments, such as prostate, lung, bladder, and gynecologic cancers. It’s especially useful for complex or advanced-stage cases.
Yes. Ethos™ is designed to enhance safety by delivering radiation more precisely and minimizing exposure to healthy organs. The technology is FDA-cleared and used at leading cancer centers around the world.
While each session may take slightly longer than conventional treatments (typically 30–45 minutes), this includes real-time imaging, plan adaptation, and physician review — all done while you’re on the treatment table.
No. Radiation therapy is painless, and the adaptive process happens while you’re comfortably positioned. Some patients may feel a bit tired after sessions, but side effects are generally minimal.
Western Radiation Oncology offers Ethos™ therapy at El Camino Hospital — one of the first centers on the West Coast to use this cutting-edge platform.