(Source: American Brachythearpy Society)
Derived from ancient Greek words for short distance (brachy) and treatment (therapy), it is sometimes called seed implantation and is an outpatient procedure used in the treatment of different kinds of cancer. Radioactive “seeds” are carefully placed inside of the cancerous tissue and positioned in a manner that will attack the cancer most efficiently.
There are 2 different kinds of brachytherapy: permanent, when the seeds remain inside of the body, and temporary, when the seeds are inside of the body and then removed. Diseases treated with temporary implants include many gynecologic cancers.
In the treatment of prostate cancer, the radioactive seeds are about the size of a grain of rice, and give off radiation that travels only a few millimeters to kill nearby cancer cells. With permanent implants (for example, prostate) the radioactivity of the seeds decays with time while the actual seeds permanently stay within the treatment area.