Response-probability volume histograms and iso-probability of response charts in treatment plan evaluation

Practical aspects and uncertainty analysis of biological effective dose (BED) regarding its three-dimensional calculation in multiphase radiotherapy treatment plans

PURPOSE

There is a growing interest in the radiation oncology community to use the biological effective dose (BED) rather than the physical dose (PD) in treatment plan evaluation and optimization due to its stronger correlation with radiobiological effects. Radiotherapy patients may receive treatments involving a single only phase or multiple phases (e.g., primary and boost). Since most treatment planning systems cannot calculate the analytical BED distribution in multiphase treatments, an approximate multiphase BED expression, which is based on the total physical dose distribution, has been used. The purpose of this paper is to reveal the mathematical properties of the approximate BED formulation, relative to the true BED.

METHODS

The mathematical properties of the approximate multiphase BED equation are analyzed and evaluated. In order to better understand the accuracy of the approximate multiphase BED equation, the true multiphase BED equation was derived and the mathematical differences between the true and approximate multiphase BED equations were determined. The magnitude of its inaccuracies under common clinical circumstances was also studied. All calculations were performed on a voxel-by-voxel basis using the three-dimensional dose matrices.

RESULTS

Results showed that the approximate multiphase BED equation is accurate only when the dose-per-fractions (DPFs) in both the first and second phases are equal, which occur when the dose distribution does not significantly change between the phases. In the case of heterogeneous dose distributions, which significantly vary between the phases, there are fewer occurrences of equal DPFs and hence the inaccuracy of the approximate multiphase BED is greater. These characteristics are usually seen in the dose distributions being delivered to organs at risk rather than to targets.

CONCLUSIONS

The finding of this study indicates that the true multiphase BED equation should be implemented in the treatment planning systems due to the inconsistent accuracy of the approximate multiphase BED equation in most of the clinical situations.

Identifying MRI markers associated with early response following laser ablation for neurological disorders: preliminary findings

There is a renewed interest in MR-guided laser interstitial thermal therapy (LITT) as a minimally invasive alternative to craniotomy for local treatment of various brain tumors and epilepsy. LITT allows for focused delivery of laser energy monitored in real time by MRI, for precise ablation of the lesion. Although highly promising, the long-term effects of laser ablation as a viable treatment option for neurological disorders have yet to be rigorously studied and quantified. In this work, we present a quantitative framework for monitoring per-voxel thermal-induced changes post-LITT over time on multi parametric MRI. We demonstrate that voxel-by-voxel quantification of MRI markers over time can enable a careful and accurate (a) characterization of early LITT-related changes (if and when they are exaggerated and when they subside), and (b) identification and monitoring of MRI markers that potentially allow for better quantification of response to LITT therapy. The framework was evaluated on two distinct cohorts of patients (GBM, epilepsy), who were monitored post-LITT at regular time-intervals via multi-parametric MRI. On a cohort of six GBM studies we found that (a) it may be important for the initial treatment-related changes to subside to more reliably capture MRI markers relating to tumor recurrence, and (b) T1w MRI and T2-GRE may better differentiate changes that may correspond to tumor recurrence from patients with no recurrence, as compared to T2w-MRI, and FLAIR. Similarly, our preliminary analysis of four epilepsy studies suggests that (a) early LITT changes (attributed to swelling, edema) appear to subside within 4-weeks post-LITT, and (b) ADC may be more reflective of early treatment changes (up to 1 month), while T1w may be more reflective of early delayed treatment changes (1 month, 3 months), while T2-w and T2-FLAIR appeared to be more sensitive to late treatment related changes (6-months post-LITT) compared to the other MRI protocols under evaluation.

Beam path toxicity in candidate organs-at-risk: assessment of radiation emetogenesis for patients receiving head and neck intensity modulated radiotherapy

BACKGROUND

To investigate potential dose-response relationship between radiation-associated nausea and vomiting (RANV) reported during radiotherapy and candidate nausea/vomiting-associated regions of interest (CNV-ROIs) in head and neck (HNC) squamous cell carcinomas.

METHODS AND MATERIAL

A total of 130 patients treated with IMRT with squamous cell carcinomas of head and neck were evaluated. For each patient, CNV-ROIs were segmented manually on planning CT images. Clinical on-treatment RANV data were reconstructed by a review of the records for all patients. Dosimetric data parameters were recorded from dose-volume histograms. Nausea and vomiting reports were concatenated as a single binary "Any N/V" variable, and as a "CTC-V2+" variable.

RESULTS

The mean dose to CNV-ROIs was higher for patients experiencing RANV events. For patients receiving IMRT alone, a dose-response effect was observed with varying degrees of magnitude, at a statistically significant level for the area postrema, brainstem, dorsal vagal complex, medulla oblongata, solitary nucleus, oropharyngeal mucosa and whole brain CNV-ROIs.

CONCLUSION

RANV is a common therapy-related morbidity facing patients receiving HNC radiotherapy, and, for those receiving radiotherapy-alone, is associated with modifiable dose to specific CNS structures.

Analysis of fractionation correction methodologies for multiple phase treatment plans in radiation therapy

PURPOSE

Radiation therapy is often delivered by multiple sequential treatment plans. For an accurate radiobiological evaluation of the overall treatment, fractionation corrections to each dose distribution must be applied before summing the three-dimensional dose matrix of each plan since the simpler approach of performing the fractionation correction to the total dose-volume histograms, obtained by the arithmetical sum of the different plans, becomes inaccurate for more heterogeneous dose patterns. In this study, the differences between these two fractionation correction methods, named here as exact (corrected before) and approximate (after summation), respectively, are assessed for different cancer types.

METHODS

Prostate, breast, and head and neck (HN) tumor patients were selected to quantify the differences between two fractionation correction methods (the exact vs the approximate). For each cancer type, two different treatment plans were developed using uniform (CRT) and intensity modulated beams (IMRT), respectively. The responses of the target and normal tissue were calculated using the Poisson linear-quadratic-time model and the relative seriality model, respectively. All treatments were radiobiologically evaluated and compared using the complication-free tumor control probability (P+), the biologically effective uniform dose (D) together with common dosimetric criteria.

RESULTS

For the prostate cancer patient, an underestimation of around 14%-15% in P+ was obtained when the fractionation correction was applied after summation compared to the exact approach due to significant biological and dosimetric variations obtained between the two fractionation correction methods in the involved lymph nodes. For the breast cancer patient, an underestimation of around 3%-4% in the maximum dose in the heart was obtained. Despite the dosimetric differences in this organ, no significant variations were obtained in treatment outcome. For the HN tumor patient, an underestimation of about 5% in treatment outcome was obtained for the CRT plan as a result of an underestimation of the planning target volume control probability by about 10%. An underestimation of about 6% in the complication probability of the right parotid was also obtained. For all the other organs at risk, dosimetric differences of up to 4% were obtained but with no significant impact in the expected clinical outcome. However, for the IMRT plan, an overestimation in P+ of 4.3% was obtained mainly due to an underestimation of the complication probability of the left and right parotids (2.9% and 5.8%, respectively).

CONCLUSIONS

The use of the exact fractionation correction method, which is applying fractionation correction on the separate dose distributions of a multiple phase treatment before their summation was found to have a significant expected clinical impact. For regions of interest that are irradiated with very heterogeneous dose distributions and significantly different doses per fraction in the different treatment phases, the exact fractionation correction method needs to be applied since a significant underestimation of the true patient outcome can be introduced otherwise.