JIET Hospital Jodhpur installs Rs 33 crore TrueBeam radiotherapy machine, first in west Rajasthan

Jaipur: JIET Medical College and Hospital (JMCH) on Pali Road in Jodhpur has installed an advanced TrueBeam radiotherapy LINAC machine, the first such system to be set up in the private healthcare sector in Western Rajasthan. The machine was inaugurated on Saturday, and hospital officials said it would mean cancer patients from the Marwar region no longer need to travel to Delhi, Jaipur, Ahmedabad or other cities for complex radiation treatment.

The unit, manufactured by Varian, was installed at a cost of approximately Rs 33 crore. It is the TrueBeam variant fitted with HDMLC (High Definition Multi-Leaf Collimator) and a 6D couch with respiratory gating capabilities. The machine was inaugurated by JMCH Principal and Controller Dr Deepak Verma, Radiation Oncologist Dr Prateek Daga, Chairperson Shashikant Singhi and Chairman Mayank Singhi.

Mayank Singhi said the machine’s high-intensity radiation does not adversely affect other parts of the body, and that it can perform highly precise Stereotactic Radiosurgery (SRS) and Stereotactic Body Radiotherapy (SBRT), which sets it apart from conventional machines. He described it as one of the most precise systems currently available for radiation therapy, particularly for complex and stereotactic cases.

Dr Verma said brain tumour cases that typically require around 30 sessions of radiotherapy on standard machines can now be completed in a single sitting with the TrueBeam system, sparing patients a prolonged course of treatment. He added that the machine also produces effective results in a shorter timeframe for several other tumour types and is designed for highly precise Image-Guided Radiotherapy (IGRT) besides SRS and SBRT.

Dr Daga said the machine’s central leaves, just 2.5 millimetres wide, allow very small or irregularly shaped tumours to be treated with precision, since the radiation beam can be shaped to match a tumour’s contours while sparing surrounding healthy organs. He said this makes the system well suited for brain tumours and metastases, spinal tumours, lung nodules, liver lesions, prostate cancer and head and neck cancers, and is also ideal for re-irradiation cases where precision is critical. The system ensures optimal dose delivery, reduces the need for frequent repositioning, and can treat multiple small lesions from a single isocenter, he said.

JMCH already operates another radiotherapy machine, the Hangshun, which currently treats around 125 cancer patients a day, most of them free of cost under various government schemes. Spread across a 30-acre campus, JMCH is the largest private cancer institute in the Marwar region and houses the largest radiotherapy complex in Western Rajasthan.