Stockholm-based Elekta announced that its Elekta Unity magnetic resonance radiation therapy (MR/RT) system has received the CE mark, clearing the technology for commercial sales and clinical use in Europe.

The company’s Unity (MR/RT) system has the potential to transform how clinicians treat cancer by enabling the delivery of the radiation dose while simultaneously visualizing a tumor and surrounding healthy tissue with high-quality MR images. Unity also integrates advanced tools that allow clinicians to adapt the patient’s treatment to this current anatomical information.

“Receiving [the] CE mark for Unity is a big achievement in revolutionizing the field of radiation therapy and a real watershed moment for treating cancer,” says Elekta president and CEO, Richard Hausmann. “The change that MR/RT will bring in cancer therapy is paramount in advancing patient treatment. I’m thankful to the MR-linac Consortium members, Philips (our MR technology partner), and our dedicated employees for helping us reach this important day.”

According to the company, the MR/RT system employs a premium high-field diagnostic-quality (1.5 Tesla) MRI that provides image clarity, giving clinicians greater flexibility in their approach to radiation therapy and ensuring that each patient receives optimal care based on individual tumor characteristics. The system integrates MR imaging, linear accelerator technologies, and advanced treatment planning into a single platform, allowing physicians to see and track difficult-to-visualize soft tissue anatomies while radiation is being delivered. The Unity MR/RT system has not been approved by the FDA for sale in the U.S.

“Unity is a tremendous innovation in patient care, one that enables a scan-plan-treat approach to developing tailored regimens that should yield substantive clinical benefits,” says Bas Raaymakers, PhD, professor of experimental clinical physics in the Department of Radiotherapy at University Medical Center Utrecht. UMC Utrecht is a founding member of the Elekta MR-linac Consortium and the inventor of the high-field MR-linac concept. “I am thrilled that our vision of personalized radiation therapy is becoming a clinical reality.”