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Use in non-cancerous diseases

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Radiation therapy is used to treat early stage Dupuytren's disease and Ledderhose disease. When Dupuytren's disease is at the nodules and cords stage or fingers are at a minimal deformation stage of less than 10 degrees, then radiation therapy is used to prevent further progress of the disease. Radiation therapy is also used post surgery in some cases to prevent the disease continuing to progress. Low doses of radiation are used typically three gray of radiation for five days, with a break of three months followed by another phase of three gray of radiation for five days.
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Side effects

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Radiation therapy is in itself painless. Many low-dose palliative treatments (for example, radiation therapy to bony metastases) cause minimal or no side effects, although short-term pain flare-up can be experienced in the days following treatment due to oedema compressing nerves in the treated area. Higher doses can cause varying side effects during treatment (acute side effects), in the months or years following treatment (long-term side effects), or after re-treatment (cumulative side effects). The nature, severity, and longevity of side effects depends on the organs that receive the radiation, the treatment itself (type of radiation, dose, fractionation, concurrent chemotherapy), and the patient. Most side effects are predictable and expected. Side effects from radiation are usually limited to the area of the patient's body that is under treatment. Side effects are dose- dependent; for example higher doses of head and neck radiation can be associated with cardiovascular complic...
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Technique

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Mechanism of action edit Radiation therapy works by damaging the DNA of cancerous cells. This DNA damage is caused by one of two types of energy, photon or charged particle. This damage is either direct or indirect ionization of the atoms which make up the DNA chain. Indirect ionization happens as a result of the ionization of water, forming free radicals, notably hydroxyl radicals, which then damage the DNA. In photon therapy, most of the radiation effect is through free radicals. Cells have mechanisms for repairing single-strand DNA damage and double-stranded DNA damage. However, double-stranded DNA breaks are much more difficult to repair, and can lead to dramatic chromosomal abnormalities and genetic deletions. Targeting double-stranded breaks increases the probability that cells will undergo cell death. Cancer cells are generally less differentiated and more stem cell-like; they reproduce more than most healthy differentiated cells, and have a diminished ability to repair sub-leth...
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