• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.304-310
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• 2010

Less execution of the electron arc treatment could in large part be attributed to the lack of an adequate planning system. Unlike most linear accelerators providing the electron arc mode, no commercial planning systems for the electron arc plan are available at this time. In this work, with the expectation that an easily accessible planning system could promote electron arc therapy, a commercial planning system was commissioned and evaluated for the electron arc plan. For the electron arc plan with use of a Varian 21-EX, Pinnacle3 (ver. 7.4f), with an electron pencil beam algorithm, was commissioned in which the arc consisted of multiple static fields with a fixed beam opening. Film dosimetry and point measurements were executed for the evaluation of the computation. Beam modeling was not satisfactory with the calculation of lateral profiles. Contrary to good agreement within 1% of the calculated and measured depth profiles, the calculated lateral profiles showed underestimation compared with measurements, such that the distance-to-agreement (DTA) was 5.1 mm at a 50% dose level for 6 MeV and 6.7 mm for 12 MeV with similar results for the measured depths. Point and film measurements for the humanoid phantom revealed that the delivered dose was more than the calculation by approximately 10%. The electron arc plan, based on the pencil beam algorithm, provides qualitative information for the dose distribution. Dose verification before the treatment should be mandatory.

• The Journal of Korean Society for Radiation Therapy
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.145-156
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• 2015

Purpose : The purpose of this study is to evaluate the efficiency of Split VMAT planning(Contouring rectum divided into an upper and a lower for reduce rectum dose) compare to Conventional VMAT planning(Contouring whole rectum) for prostate cancer radiotherapy involving pelvic lymph nodes. Materials and Methods : A total of 9 cases were enrolled. Each case received radiotherapy with Split VMAT planning to the prostate involving pelvic lymph nodes. Treatment was delivered using TrueBeam STX(Varian Medical Systems, USA) and planned on Eclipse(Ver. 10.0.42, Varian, USA), PRO3(Progressive Resolution Optimizer 10.0.28), AAA(Anisotropic Analytic Algorithm Ver. 10.0.28). Lower rectum contour was defined as starting 1cm superior and ending 1cm inferior to the prostate PTV, upper rectum is a part, except lower rectum from the whole rectum. Split VMAT plan parameters consisted of 10MV coplanar $360^{\circ}$ arcs. Each arc had $30^{\circ}$ and $30^{\circ}$ collimator angle, respectively. An SIB(Simultaneous Integrated Boost) treatment prescription was employed delivering 50.4Gy to pelvic lymph nodes and 63~70Gy to the prostate in 28 fractions. $D_{mean}$ of whole rectum on Split VMAT plan was applied for DVC(Dose Volume Constraint) of the whole rectum for Conventional VMAT plan. In addition, all parameters were set to be the same of existing treatment plans. To minimize the dose difference that shows up randomly on optimizing, all plans were optimized and calculated twice respectively using a 0.2cm grid. All plans were normalized to the prostate $PTV_{100%}$ = 90% or 95%. A comparison of $D_{mean}$ of whole rectum, upperr ectum, lower rectum, and bladder, $V_{50%}$ of upper rectum, total MU and H.I.(Homogeneity Index) and C.I.(Conformity Index) of the PTV was used for technique evaluation. All Split VMAT plans were verified by gamma test with portal dosimetry using EPID. Results : Using DVH analysis, a difference between the Conventional and the Split VMAT plans was demonstrated. The Split VMAT plan demonstrated better in the $D_{mean}$ of whole rectum, Up to 134.4 cGy, at least 43.5 cGy, the average difference was 75.6 cGy and in the $D_{mean}$ of upper rectum, Up to 1113.5 cGy, at least 87.2 cGy, the average difference was 550.5 cGy and in the $D_{mean}$ of lower rectum, Up to 100.5 cGy, at least -34.6 cGy, the average difference was 34.3 cGy and in the $D_{mean}$ of bladder, Up to 271 cGy, at least -55.5 cGy, the average difference was 117.8 cGy and in $V_{50%}$ of upper rectum, Up to 63.4%, at least 3.2%, the average difference was 23.2%. There was no significant difference on H.I., and C.I. of the PTV among two plans. The Split VMAT plan is average 77 MU more than another. All IMRT verification gamma test results for the Split VMAT plan passed over 90.0% at 2 mm / 2%. Conclusion : As a result, the Split VMAT plan appeared to be more favorable in most cases than the Conventional VMAT plan for prostate cancer radiotherapy involving pelvic lymph nodes. By using the split VMAT planning technique it was possible to reduce the upper rectum dose, thus reducing whole rectal dose when compared to conventional VMAT planning. Also using the split VMAT planning technique increase the treatment efficiency.

• Radiation Oncology Journal
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.71-79
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• 1998

Purpose : The objective of this study is to introduce our installation of a non-commercial 3D Planning system, Plunc and confirm it's clinical applicability in various treatment situations. Materials and Methods : We obtained source codes of Plunc, offered by University of North Carolina and installed them on a Pentium Pro 200MHz (128MB RAM, Millenium VGA) with Linux operating system. To examine accuracy of dose distributions calculated by Plunc, we input beam data of 6MV Photon of our linear accelerator(Siemens MXE 6740) including tissue-maximum ratio, scatter-maximum ratio, attenuation coefficients and shapes of wedge filters. After then, we compared values of dose distributions(Percent depth dose; PDD, dose profiles with and without wedge filters, oblique incident beam, and dose distributions under air-gap) calculated by Plunc with measured values. Results : Plunc operated in almost real time except spending about 10 seconds in full volume dose distribution and dose-volume histogram(DVH) on the PC described above. As compared with measurements for irradiations of 90-cm 550 and 10-cm depth isocenter, the PDD curves calculated by Plunc did not exceed $1\%$ of inaccuracies except buildup region. For dose profiles with and without wedge filter, the calculated ones are accurate within $2\%$ except low-dose region outside irradiations where Plunc showed $5\%$ of dose reduction. For the oblique incident beam, it showed a good agreement except low dose region below $30\%$ of isocenter dose. In the case of dose distribution under air-gap, there was $5\%$ errors of the central-axis dose. Conclusion : By comparing photon dose calculations using the Plunc with measurements, we confirmed that Plunc showed acceptable accuracies about $2-5\%$ in typical treatment situations which was comparable to commercial planning systems using correction-based a1gorithms. Plunc does not have a function for electron beam planning up to the present. However, it is possible to implement electron dose calculation modules or more accurate photon dose calculation into the Plunc system. Plunc is shown to be useful to clear many limitations of 2D planning systems in clinics where a commercial 3D planning system is not available.