Car-borne survey and dose assessment from external radiation exposure in Bangka Island.

With a history of more than 200 years of tin mining, Bangka Island has brought along a byproduct of heavy minerals containing radionuclide elements. There are some concerns about this byproduct material contributing to natural radiation in the environment. In this study, a car-borne survey was conducted to accurately assess natural background radiation in Bangka Island. Indoor and outdoor ambient dose rates in 146 houses were also measured to assess the radiation dose from external exposure received by the public. Soil samples were collected and measured using a gamma spectroscopy system to evaluate the contributions of specific radionuclides to external terrestrial exposure. From 3790 measurement points during the car-borne survey, the highest ambient dose equivalent rate was 596 nSv h-1 measured in Muntok area, with a mean value of 101 nSv h-1 and a median value of 95 nSv h-1. The ambient dose equivalent rate distribution map showed a relatively higher value in the northern coastal area of the island, where the Pemali tin deposit is located. The annual effective dose received from external radiation in the 146 houses in Bangka Island ranged from 0.44 to 1.30 mSv year-1, with a median value of 0.66 mSv year-1. The soil contained a relatively high amount of thorium (232Th), which contributed 69% to external radiation exposure in Bangka Island.

Quality assurance for dynamic tumor tracking.

The purpose of this work was to develop a treatment plan verification routine for a linear accelerator dedicated to SBRT treatments with gimbal based dynamic tumor tracking using three commercially available phantoms. The accelerator system has two special features: It operates with a rotation of the ring shaped gantry instead of a couch rotation and target motion can be compensated for via a gimbal system (dynamic tumor tracking, DTT). DTT plans were each measured with the three different phantoms. Afterwards the measured dose distribution was compared with the calculated dose distribution via global Gamma Index analysis (3mm / 3%, threshold: 10%). The global gamma pass rates were on average (93.5±7.2) % for ArcCHECK, (98.0±2.6) % for OCTAVIUS® 4D and (98.4±4.2) % for MatriXX Evolution. All three systems could be used for quality assurance with ring rotations and DTT, however, each with limitations.

Effect of VERO pan-tilt motion on the dose distribution.

Tumor tracking is an option for intra-fractional motion management in radiotherapy. The VERO gimbal tracking system creates a unique beam geometry and understanding the effect of the gimbal motion in terms of dose distribution is important to assess the dose deviation from the reference conditions. Beam profiles, output factors (OF) and percentage depth doses (PDD) were measured and evaluated to investigate this effect. In order to find regions affected by the pan-tilt motion, synthesized 2D dose distributions were generated. An evaluation of the 2D dose distribution with the reference position was done using dose difference criteria 1%-4%. The OF and point dose at central axis were measured and compared with the reference position. Furthermore, the PDDs were measured using a special monitoring approach to filtering inaccurate points during the acquisition. Beam profiles evaluation showed that the effect of pan-tilt at inline direction was stronger than at the crossline direction. The maximum average deviation of the full width half maximum (FWHM), flatness, symmetry, penumbra left and right were 0.39 ± 0.25 mm, 0.62 ± 0.50%, 0.76 ± 0.59%, 0.22 ± 0.16 mm, and 0.19 ± 0.15 mm respectively. The ÔF and the measured dose average deviation were <0.5%. The mechanical accuracies during the PDD measurements were 0.28 ± 0.09 mm and 0.21 ± 0.09 mm for pan and tilt and pan or tilt position. The PDD average deviations were 0.58 ± 0.26 % and 0.54 ± 0.25 % for pan-or-tilt and pan-and-tilt position respectively. All the results showed that the deviation at pan and tilt position are higher than pan or tilt. The most influences were observed for the penumbra region and the shift of radiation beam path.

Dosimetric accuracy of the cone-beam CT-based treatment planning of the Vero system: a phantom study.

We report an investigation on the accuracy of dose calculation based on the cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) images of the nonbowtie filter kV imaging system of the Vero linear accelerator. Different sets of materials and tube voltages were employed to generate the Hounsfield unit lookup tables (HLUTs) for both CBCT and fan-beam CT (FBCT) systems. The HLUTs were then implemented for the dose calculation in a treatment planning system (TPS). Dosimetric evaluation was carried out on an in-house-developed cube phantom that consists of water-equivalent slabs and inhomogeneity inserts. Two independent dosimeters positioned in the cube phantom were used in this study for point-dose and two-dimensional (2D) dose distribution measurements. The differences of HLUTs from various materials and tube voltages in both CT systems resulted in differences in dose calculation accuracy. We found that the higher the tube voltage used to obtain CT images, the better the point-dose calculation and the gamma passing rate of the 2D dose distribution agree to the values determined in the TPS. Moreover, the insert materials that are not tissue-equivalent led to higher dose-calculation inaccuracy. There were negligible differences in dosimetric evaluation between the CBCT- and FBCT-based treatment planning if the HLUTs were generated using the tissue-equivalent materials. In this study, the CBCT images of the Vero system from a complex inhomogeneity phantom can be applied for the TPS dose calculation if the system is calibrated using tissue-equivalent materials scanned at high tube voltage (i.e., 120 kV).

Noncoplanar verification: a feasibility study using Philips' Pinnacle3 treatment planning system.

Noncoplanar fields are normally used to improve the dose conformity of the target while sparing organs at risk. One of the methods to verify the dose distribution from the noncoplanar fields is by comparing their planar dose distributions from the treatment planning system (TPS) and the measured ones; for example, using film or electronic portal imaging devices (EPID). The planar dose distributions of the measurement tools, that are normally perpendicular to the central axis of the beam, can be calculated by creating special structures to mimic them in the TPS. With TPS commercially available today, however, it is not easy to create these special structures, especially in the noncoplanar configuration. For this work, we have written in-house scripts in the Pinnacle(3) TPS that can create the structures and define them as virtual planes. These virtual planes can be generated for any arbitrary gantry and couch angles, as well as source to planar distance, so that the planar dose maps at these planes can be computed. Two independent quality assurance (QA) tools were used to validate the planar dose distributions computed using the scripts for three open fields and one IMRT field at several different couch angles. The absolute planar dose patterns measured by the QA tools for all fields at all couch angles were found to be in good agreement, more than 95% (gamma criteria 3% delta dose and 3 mm distance to agreement), with the calculated ones by TPS. The results of this feasibility study can be valuable either for pretreatment dose verification or for in vivo dosimetry that directly implements the planar dose distributions from the TPS, particularly for the noncoplanar fields.