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ahwatukee foothills news
Celebrating 36 years of service
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Wednesday, July 23, 2014
www.ahwatukee.com
Volume 38, Number 87
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inside neighborhood p3, calendar p4, community p6, opinion p12, Arts & Life p14, sports & rec p17, classified p20
Free of charge
Today: High 113, Low 88, Partly
cloudy
Tomorrow: High 114, Low 91,
Partly cloudy
cover story
No need to
cut it out
By Allison Hurtado
AHWAtukee FootHiLLs NeWs
community:
A return to
musical roots
Kyrene teacher back with
Phoenix Boys Choir as
training director; p6
Arts & Life:
‘trekking the
national Parks’
Ahwatukee man’s board
game lets players explore
national parks; p14
sPorts:
Get your tickets
Taking a look at the top
10 SEV football games;
p17
New technology is making
treating certain types of skin
cancer easier than ever before
with treatments so nonevasive
that they can be done in a dermatologist’s office.
electronic brachytherapy
(eBx) uses a targeted, precise
form of radiation applied directly to the skin to treat nonmelanoma cancer cells. the radiation is powerful enough to kill the
cancer but gentle enough that in
most cases it leaves no scarring,
and the treatment can be given in
almost any doctor or dermatologist’s office. this new technology is being used to treat several
skin cancer patients at Ahwatukee skin and Laser in Ahwatukee Foothills.
“skin cancers by nature are superficial,” said Dr. Richard Levy,
director of radiation oncology at
Ahwatukee skin and Laser. “in
order to give radiation treatment
to a superficial area, the energy
of the radiation beam you need
to create is much smaller than
you need to do treatments on the
interior of the body. A small machine can create the low-energy
beam and that has several advantages.”
Patients with common types
of skin cancer like basal or squamous cell carcinoma can come
into the office, lie down on a table and be treated by a machine
set up to send radiation beams to
>> See Skin on page 13
Ahwatukee clinic using new technology
to treat skin cancer without slicing
educAtion
Valerie Shand, of Esperanza Elementary
School, receives her laptop during
orientation for new teachers for the
Kyrene School District on Monday, July 21.
[David Jolkovski/AFN]
New Kyrene
instructors
learn ins,
outs of
district at
orientation
By Daniel Ochoa
AHWAtukee FootHiLLs NeWs
Radiation Therapist Keith Witt treats David Werner’s basal cell carcinoma with the
brachytherapy system at Ahwatukee Skin and Laser on Friday, July 18. [David Jolkovski/AFN]
First-year teachers at the
kyrene school District gathered at the district office Monday
morning and attended teacher
orientation where they received
information on what to expect
for the coming school year and
a career within kyrene.
superintendent Dr. David
schauer opened the orientation
and spoke to more than 125 new
schoolteachers about the kyrene
community and the different resources the district offers.
schauer explained to the teachers that they’re the best ambassadors for kyrene and further
the success of the district.
it has become district tradition
to host these types of events for
new teachers at kyrene, and help
them with “first-year” nerves,
he said.
“i think it helps because
they’re with other teachers who
are experiencing the same thing,
and they’re getting oriented so
>> See Teachers on page 13
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ahwatukee.com | Ahwatukee Foothills News | Wednesday, July 23, 2014
Skin
Radiation
Therapist Keith
Witt treats David
Werner’s basal
cell carcinoma
with the
brachytherapy
system at
Ahwatukee
Skin and Laser
on Friday,
July 18. [David
Jolkovski/AFN]
>> From page 1
the exact area that is affected. Treatments take an average of three minutes per
site, and most patients need
between eight and 12 treatments, Levy said. Most patients come in three times
a week for treatments and
are in the office for about a
half-hour.
The most common side effect is a small red spot, resembling a sunburn, where
the radiation hits the skin or
possibly peeling at the site.
Both go away with time.
The electronic brachytherapy treatment is unique because there is no cutting.
“This treatment is best for
those who have lesions in a
cosmetically sensitive location such as eyelids, nose, lips,
ears, where some people prefer to have less of a surgical
scar or divot hole of sorts,”
Levy said. “No matter how
good the surgeons are, some
places are hard to cut out the
tumor without leaving a little bit of a mark. Also on patients who are poor woundhealing patients, which is not
rare in older patients or patients with diabetes or blood-
thinning medications.”
David Werner, 75, is one of
those patients on blood-thinning medication. He said he
has tried several different
techniques for getting rid of
skin cancer over the years.
He’s 80 percent through his
treatment at Ahwatukee Skin
and Laser for a spot on his
nose and one on his shoulder and said this is the easiest treatment by far he’s ever
been through.
“This is a piece of cake,” he
said. “It’s so much easier, so
much less blood. I’ve got sites
all over where they had to cut
skin cancer off. This is really nice. I’ve been through this
enough to know what’s really
nice. I recommend this.”
Ahwatukee Skin and Laser
has been offering the treatment in its office since late
February. Most dermatolo-
gists aren’t familiar with radiation treatment, so while the
technology has been available
for a few years, they are only
beginning to use it regularly.
Levy said he travels to several
different dermatologists’ offices in the Southwest and offers consulting on electronic
brachytherapy cases.
According to Levy, the
success rate for the treatment over the long term is
95 to 98 percent, meaning the
cancer is killed and does not
come back. Serious side effects, which Levy said he has
never seen, occur in about
1 percent of cases.
For more information on
the treatment, contact Ahwatukee Skin and Laser at
(480) 582-1121 or www.ahwatukeeskincare.com.
• Contact writer: (480) 898-7914
or ahurtado@ahwatukee.com.
13
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e’s
Ahwatukee
Favorit
Superintendent Dr. David Schauer speaks during orientation for new teachers for the Kyrene School District on Monday,
July 21. [David Jolkovski/AFN]
Teachers
>> From page 1
they know what they’re getting into,” Schauer said. “It
takes a lot of the fear away.
We want to make sure that
they feel very good about being here.”
Once Schauer finished
with his morning briefing,
the new teachers broke into
groups where they mingled
among their colleagues and
received instructions on how
to use Kyrene’s technological tools.
Teachers were given the
laptop that they’ll use during
the school year and were instructed on how to log onto
Kyrene’s system.
Allison Kirby, first-year
special education resource
teacher at Centennial Middle
School, said the orientation
furthered her excitement for
the first day of school, which
is Monday, Aug. 4.
Kirby, who’s an Ahwatukee resident, chose to teach
in the Kyrene district due to
its high performance in education.
“I’m excited to be part of this
community,” she said. “I’m excited to meet my kids, to be a
teacher at Kyrene and do what
I love to do. … I can’t wait.”
New teachers also visited
their “home-school” where
they familiarized themselves
with the buildings and their
classroom.
Samantha Hodgkins, firstyear special education resource teacher at Kyrene de
la Esperanza Elementary
School, said the orientation
gave her different resources
on how to get involved with
the Kyrene experience.
Hodgkins, a Kyrene alum,
said she wanted to be a teacher in Kyrene because it’s one
of the top districts around.
“I had a great experience
here in elementary school, so
I wouldn’t want to be part of
any other district,” she said.
“I’m looking forward to meeting the kids and hopefully
making an impact to their
lives for the better.”
The orientation will stretch
throughout the week where
teachers will receive schoolbased training, technology
training and overview on curriculum and resources.
For more information
about Kyrene, visit www.
kyrene.org.
• Contact writer: (480) 898-4903
or dochoa@ahwatukee.com.
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