Gamma Knife Icon Stereotactic Radiotherapy at Gamma Knife Centre Krefeld

Gamma Knife Icon stereotactic radiotherapy at the Gamma Knife Centre Krefeld is a non-invasive radiosurgery service that delivers highly focused radiation with submillimeter targeting, aiming to concentrate the effective dose inside the lesion while sparing surrounding structures as much as possible. The centre is a multidisciplinary program in which neurosurgeons and radiation oncologists work closely with Helios Hospital Krefeld. It has performed over 10,000 treatments since 1998 and is ISO-certified as a radiosurgery facility. Technically, the Gamma Knife Icon platform uses multiple cobalt-60 sources whose beams are individually low dose but converge at a defined focal point, creating a high therapeutic dose where the beams meet while limiting exposure outside the target. The centre has the Icon’s integrated cone-beam CT as a practical advantage for difficult locations and larger lesions, including targets near critical structures such as the optic system and brain stem, and it is able to deliver either single-session radiosurgery or hypofractionated stereotactic radiotherapy spread over several days, commonly across four to five days for larger tumors when a staged approach is clinically safer. Within the Krefeld program, stereotactic radiosurgery is used for a broad set of intracranial, skull-base, and selected head-and-neck targets. The brain indications explicitly include brain metastases, acoustic neuroma, meningiomas, pituitary adenoma, trigeminal neuralgia, arteriovenous malformation, chordomas and chondrosarcomas, primary brain tumors, and neuromas affecting other cranial nerves. For eye disease, the centre lists uveal melanoma. For ear-region disease, it lists acoustic neuroma and glomus jugulare tumors. For the head and neck, it lists brain metastases and primary carcinomas. The care track typically begins with a detailed consultation in which the team explains the diagnosis and discusses all relevant therapy options, not only radiosurgery, so the patient can make an informed decision; the centre describes this consultation as covering the method, expected success, and potential side effects. Immediately prior to planning and treatment, the target is localized with high-quality imaging; the centre describes MRI as standard, CT added for certain diseases, and angiographic imaging, such as DSA, used to visualize blood vessels when needed, with image datasets transferred into planning systems to build a precise three-dimensional treatment plan. On the treatment day, immobilization is chosen to match the treatment concept. For single-session radiosurgery, the centre describes attaching a stereotactic frame to the head to achieve submillimeter accuracy, using local anesthesia at the attachment points; when lesions are larger or when hypofractionation is selected, it describes using a thermoplastic mask and delivering treatment over multiple sessions. During irradiation the patient lies on the treatment couch while the planned dose is delivered; the centre describes the process as painless and notes that treatment time commonly ranges from about 30 to 120 minutes depending on the indication, with an average radiosurgery time often cited as 30–90 minutes for Gamma Knife Icon plans, and it emphasizes that treatment can be paused if the patient needs a break. For many patients, Gamma Knife Icon radiosurgery is performed on an outpatient basis or with only a short hospital stay, and patients do not need to arrive fasting. After treatment, follow-up is organized around the underlying disease and expected response kinetics rather than immediate surgical removal. It is recommended to consider MRI checkups every 4 to 6 months initially, and later annually, as part of radiosurgery aftercare to detect residual or recurrent growth and to monitor late effects.