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Doctors at Vantage Oncology Glendale Radiation Therapy Center are hoping that a set of $1,200 transponders the size of rice grains will put them on the cutting edge of prostate cancer treatment.

The tiny, glass-covered devices — used at only one other facility in the Los Angeles area — can be implanted into a patient’s prostate and monitored using a radio receiver and infrared cameras to give doctors an unprecedented, real-time look at the gland, said Linas Kazlauskas, a doctor and medical director at the center.

Images produced by the Calypso 4D Localization System can be used to help physicians precisely target a patient’s prostate with radiation beams, Kazlauskas said. The improved accuracy with radiation will help prevent damage to healthy tissue surrounding the cancer-affected gland, he said.

The prostate can often shift up to 5 centimeters because of changes in the surrounding organs. Without monitoring the gland’s movement, this could result in treatment to healthy tissues that might move into the path of radiation beams, which are used to kill cancerous matter.

“The whole objective here is to hit the cancer and not hit the bladder or the rectum,” he said.

While other systems exist to visually monitor the prostate, which can suddenly change positions, the Calypso system provides the most accurate position possible because of its transponders, said Kenneth Russel, professor of medicine at the University of Washington and medical director for Seattle-based Calypso Medical, which makes the system.

“There is nothing on the market right now that has the multiple-times-a-second imaging that the Calypso system does,” he said.

Tracking the movement of the prostate not only allows doctors to adjust treatment, but also gives them the ability to be more aggressive, said Parvesh Kumar, professor and chairman of radiation oncology at USC’s Keck School of Medicine.

“It allows for very high doses to be given very precisely, which targets the tumor and spares surrounding critical organs of the high doses of radiation, and it’s very effective,” Kumar said.

The system costs $400,000 to $500,000, depending on its configuration and options, according to Calypso.

That price is on top of the cost of each three-piece set of the tiny, glass-covered devices that are implanted into each patient.