Radiation therapy
Radiation oncology is the medical specialty concerned with prescribing radiation. This is different than radiology, the use of radiation in medical imaging and diagnosis). Radiation may be prescribed by a radiation oncologist with intent to cure ("curative"). It may also be used as palliative treatment (where cure is not possible and the aim is for local disease control or symptomatic relief) or as therapeutic treatment (where the therapy has survival benefit and it can be curative). It is also common to combine radiation therapy with surgery, chemotherapy, hormone therapy, Immunotherapy or some mixture of the four.