Precedence for prostate brachytherapy

Abstract

Purpose: To identify the earliest practitioners of prostate brachytherapy.

Methods and materials: Review of contemporary literature.

Results: Radiotherapy has been used for benign prostatic ailments as early as 1902. Prostate cancer was first treated by teletherapy in 1904. Several urologists, in Paris and Vienna, applied intracavitary radium for prostate disease in 1908-1909. We present evidence that Henri Minet was the first to perform prostate brachytherapy, as early as 1908.

Conclusion: Brachytherapy has been used to treat prostate cancer for more than a century.