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Title: The first clinical treatment with kilovoltage intrafraction monitoring (KIM): A real-time image guidance method

Journal Article · · Medical Physics
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1118/1.4904023· OSTI ID:22413390
;  [1];  [2];  [3]; ;  [4]; ;  [5]; ; ; ; ;  [6]
  1. Radiation Physics Laboratory, Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales 2006 (Australia)
  2. Radiation Physics Laboratory, Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales 2006, Australia and School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales 2006 (Australia)
  3. Radiation Physics Laboratory, Sydney Medical School, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales 2006, Australia and Northern Sydney Cancer Centre, Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales 2065 (Australia)
  4. Department of Oncology, Aarhus University Hospital, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark and Institute of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University, 8000 Aarhus C (Denmark)
  5. School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales 2006, Australia and Northern Sydney Cancer Centre, Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales 2065 (Australia)
  6. Northern Sydney Cancer Centre, Royal North Shore Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales 2065 (Australia)

Purpose: Kilovoltage intrafraction monitoring (KIM) is a real-time image guidance method that uses widely available radiotherapy technology, i.e., a gantry-mounted x-ray imager. The authors report on the geometric and dosimetric results of the first patient treatment using KIM which occurred on September 16, 2014. Methods: KIM uses current and prior 2D x-ray images to estimate the 3D target position during cancer radiotherapy treatment delivery. KIM software was written to process kilovoltage (kV) images streamed from a standard C-arm linear accelerator with a gantry-mounted kV x-ray imaging system. A 120° pretreatment kV imaging arc was acquired to build the patient-specific 2D to 3D motion correlation. The kV imager was activated during the megavoltage (MV) treatment, a dual arc VMAT prostate treatment, to estimate the 3D prostate position in real-time. All necessary ethics, legal, and regulatory requirements were met for this clinical study. The quality assurance processes were completed and peer reviewed. Results: During treatment, a prostate position offset of nearly 3 mm in the posterior direction was observed with KIM. This position offset did not trigger a gating event. After the treatment, the prostate motion was independently measured using kV/MV triangulation, resulting in a mean difference of less than 0.6 mm and standard deviation of less than 0.6 mm in each direction. The accuracy of the marker segmentation was visually assessed during and after treatment and found to be performing well. During treatment, there were no interruptions due to performance of the KIM software. Conclusions: For the first time, KIM has been used for real-time image guidance during cancer radiotherapy. The measured accuracy and precision were both submillimeter for the first treatment fraction. This clinical translational research milestone paves the way for the broad implementation of real-time image guidance to facilitate the detection and correction of geometric and dosimetric errors, and resultant improved clinical outcomes, in cancer radiotherapy.

OSTI ID:
22413390
Journal Information:
Medical Physics, Vol. 42, Issue 1; Other Information: (c) 2015 American Association of Physicists in Medicine; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0094-2405
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English