X-ray radiotherapy equipment (1905). Historical photograph of the London Hospital's Radiotherapy department in 1905. The anticancer X-ray treatment provided was known as Roentgen therapy. The room contains three treatment chairs, each facing a movable electric discharge tube. No shielding is provided against stray X-rays so that the patient in the middle would have been subjected to added radiation from the adjacent X-ray tubes. This early radiotherapy equipment was used to treat such cancers as basal cell carcinoma (skin) and breast malignancies. Although some success in this method was achieved, there was an ignorance of the dangers of an overdose of X-ray radiation.