SKF’s 14-year commitment to supporting the battle against cancer

SKF’s 14-year commitment to supporting the battle against cancer

Over 14 years ago Varian Medical Systems, the leader in integrated radiation therapy systems, specified for the first time the use of a recirculating roller screw manufactured by SKF, the world’s leading knowledge engineering company, to provide the accuracy, precision, rigidity, reliability and high load capacity required for the positioning and lifting of its Clinac, Ximatron and Exact cancer treatment couches. Over 4,000 medical couches without a single failure later, the partnership is still going strong to ensure the manufacture of some of the most superior medical couches available, allowing optimum patient treatment, comfort and safety.

Oncology, or the treatment of cancer, requires equipment that can provide ultra precise positioning with incredible levels of reliability. The location and treatment of a cancer tumour requires patients to be positioned under a high energy treatment beam to receive a series of carefully controlled and accurately targeted doses of radiation, spread over a number of weeks. Accordingly, the height of the treatment couch is crucial in order to ensure precise and repeatable targeting of each individual patient within the radiation treatment beam.