Gastrointestinal Cancer Care

Mass General Brigham’s approach to cancer care

Your care team may include:

• Gastroenterologists
• Interventional radiologists
• Medical oncologists
• Radiation oncologists
• Surgical oncologists
• Oncology nurses and nurse practitioners
• Dieticians
• Oncology psychiatrists and social workers
• Palliative care providers
• Pathologists
• Diagnostic radiologists

Our GI cancer specialists meet regularly in tumor boards and conferences to discuss each patient’s diagnosis, treatment plan, and progress. This collaboration supports informed decision-making and personalized care as part of a multidisciplinary approach for each patient.

We offer highly targeted radiation treatments designed to treat cancer while limiting exposure to surrounding healthy tissue, including:

• Intraoperative radiation therapy: Radiation delivered during surgery to treat remaining cancer cells.
• Linear accelerator-based fractional radiation therapy: Customized radiation beams that precisely target tumors over a series of treatments.
• Online adaptive radiotherapy: A type of radiation therapy that clinicians adjust in real time based on daily changes in a patient’s anatomy. This approach allows for more precise targeting of tumors while helping to reduce side effects.
• Proton therapy: An advanced form of radiation that uses high-energy proton particles instead of X-rays to deliver precise treatment.
• Stereotactic body radiation therapy: High-dose radiation delivered to specific areas in fewer treatment sessions.

Our surgical oncologists focus exclusively on treating GI cancers and use advanced techniques, including robot-assisted surgery. This minimally invasive approach is more precise and uses smaller incisions. For patients, this often means a lower risk of complications and a faster recovery.

For patients with advanced disease, our surgeons offer cytoreductive surgery and multivisceral resections, tailored to each individual patient.