Photo from VLADI project
Child watches a movie while undergoing radiotherapy
VIENNA, AUSTRIA—Children with cancer may not require general anesthesia prior to radiotherapy if they can watch videos during their treatment, according to research presented at the ESTRO 36 conference (abstract OC-0546).
Allowing children to watch videos during radiotherapy reduced but did not completely eliminate the use of anesthesia in this small study.
The use of videos proved less traumatic than anesthesia for children and their families, as well as making each treatment quicker and more cost-effective, according to study investigator Catia Aguas, of the Cliniques Universitaires Saint Luc in Brussels, Belgium.
“Being treated with radiotherapy means coming in for a treatment every weekday for 4 to 6 weeks,” Aguas noted. “The children need to remain motionless during treatment, and, on the whole, that means a general anesthesia. That, in turn, means they have to keep their stomach empty for 6 hours before the treatment.”
“We wanted to see if installing a projector and letting children watch a video of their choice would allow them to keep still enough that we would not need to give them anesthesia.”
The study included 12 children, ages 1.5 to 6 years, who were treated with radiotherapy using a Tomotherapy® treatment unit at the university hospital. Six children were treated before a video projector was installed in 2014, and 6 were treated after.
Before the video was available, general anesthesia was needed for 83.3% of children’s treatments. Once the projector was installed, anesthesia was needed in 33.3% of treatments.
“Radiotherapy can be very scary for children,” Aguas noted. “It’s a huge room full of machines and strange noises, and the worst part is that they’re in the room alone during their treatment. Before their radiotherapy treatment, they have already been through a series of tests and treatments, some of them painful, so when they arrive for radiotherapy, they don’t really feel very safe or confident.”
“Since we started using videos, children are a lot less anxious. Now they know that they’re going to watch a movie of their choice, they’re more relaxed, and, once the movie starts, it’s as though they travel to another world. Sponge Bob, Cars, and Barbie have been popular movie choices with our patients.”
The research also showed that treatments that used to take 1 hour or more now take around 15 to 20 minutes. This is partly because of the time saved by not having to prepare and administer anesthesia, but it is also because the children who know they are going to watch videos are more cooperative.
“Now, in our clinic, video has almost completely replaced anesthesia, resulting in reduced treatment times and reduction of stress for the young patients and their families,” Aguas said.
She also noted that the projector was inexpensive and simple to install.
“In radiotherapy, everything is usually very expensive, but, in this case, it was not,” Aguas said. “We bought a projector, and, with the help of college students, we created a support to fix the device to the patient couch. Using video is saving money and resources by reducing the need for anesthesia.”
Aguas and her colleagues continue to study children who have been treated since the projector was installed, and the team is extending the project to include adult patients who are claustrophobic or anxious.
