Introduction

Method for the development of treatment planning systems (TPS) for intraoperative radiotherapy (IORT). The technique allows to correct the preoperative CT image by scanning the 3D profile of the patient’s new anatomy, performed immediately after the removal of the tumor mass.

Technical features

Despite the high theoretical efficacy of IORT, which allows to selectively deliver the radiation dose to the tumor mass, the development of this type of radiotherapy is strongly hindered by the lack of a TPS which takes into account the patient’s anatomical changes after the intervention, for the  optimization of beam parameters (direction, energy, collimators) and correct calculation of the dose distribution to the target and healthy tissues. State of art techniques are intra-operative CT and manual correction of pre-operative CT; these have led to results difficult to apply and not enough accurate respectively. The developed method allows to correct, the image acquired in the preoperative phase, with the anatomical changes that occur in the treated area using a 3D scan. The resulting image can thus be used for treatment planning.

Possible Applications

• Intra Operative Radiation Therapy.

Advantages

Compared to post-operative CT:

• Acquisition time reduction;
• Cost containment;
• Less invasive procedure.

Compared to the manual correction of the preoperative image:

• More realistic anatomical representation;
• Increased treatment planning accuracy.