A phamtom study: In vivo rectal dosimetry of high dose rate brachytherapy in cervical cancer
4Citations
The purpose of this study was to perform in-vivo dosimetry using a diode rectal dosimeter in phantom and compare the dose delivered to the rectum between the dose measured by the diode dosimeter and the dose calculated by the treatment planning system in cervical cancer. The PTW T9112 diode detector calibrations were performed to find the correction factor. Then the calibrated diode detector was used to measure the radiation dose received in the rectum area in the in-house pelvic phantom. An Iridium-192 source was loaded into the phantom with 7 Gy, the measurements were 3 times per treatment plan, with 15 total plans studied. The average cumulative charge (nC) of each plan was converted to the absorbed dose (mGy) for comparison with the treatment planning system. Finally, to test the hypothesis that an absorbed dose from the detector and the treatment planning system were not significantly different, dependent t-test statistical analysis was applied with p-value <0.05. For distance and direction correction factors, we found that the factors were approximately 1 at 5 cm and 180°. The percentage differences of radiation dose between the diode dosimeter and the treatment planning system were between -3.3 and 4.1%. Statistical analysis revealed that the doses from the detector and the treatment planning system were not statistically significant different. The comparison showed that the percent difference between diode dosimeter and treatment planning system was acceptable to perform the in vivo dosimetry in brachytherapy. Therefore, the diode detector may be a suitable candidate for a treatment verification system in cervical cancer brachytherapy to prevent the dose delivery errors that directly affect the prognosis and may cause complications for the patient.