Author(s)

Maria F. Chan, Qinghui Zhang, Jingdong Li, Preeti Parhar, Karen Schupak, Chandra Burman

Department of Radiation Oncology, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Basking Ridge, USA.

Purpose: To evaluate the measured dose distributions using radiochromic EBT2 films for small fields in iPlan (BrainLab) commissioning. Methods: Radiochromic EBT2 films were irradiated with 6 MV photons on a Varian Trilogy linac using polystyrene phantoms. The measurements included dose profiles and depth doses for field sizes of 1 × 1, 2 × 2, 3 × 3, 4 × 4, and 10 × 10 cm² etc. The dose profile measurements were taken at the depth of 5 cm. The calibration films were irradiated at d_max(1.4 cm) for doses up to 6 Gy. Films were scanned using an Epson 10,000 XL flatbed scanner with 72 dpi resolution. Pixel values were converted to doses using the established calibration-curve. The 2D dose distributions were generated from the film data analysis. In-house software was utilized to compare the measured doses from films with the treatment planning data. In addition, selected patients’ SRS fields were also measured with the EBT2 films for comparison with iPlan. An EDGE^TM detector was also used to check the centralaxis doses for the SRS patients’ measurements. Results and Discussion: The measured planar dose distributions achieved more than 98% and 95% passing rates with a set of 2%/2 mm dose and DTA criteria for all square fields and all patient treatment fields (<5 × 5 cm²), respectively. Agreement with measurement data with the EDGE^TM detector at the central axis (±1%) was found with the plan data. This is the first report for SRS small photon-field measurement using the latest radiochromic film, EBT2. The results shown in this work indicate that the use of EBT2 film provides accurate dosimetry measure-ments for small photon beams. The measurements show excellent agreement with the iPlan TP commissioning data. Conclusions: The patient-specific EBT2 film QA for iPlan SRS patients showed good results. The EBT2 films could potentially be a useful dosimeter in verification of commissioning as well as patient-specific QA for SRS cases.

Radiochromic Film; Dosimetry; Radiosurgery; Commissioning; Radiotherapy

M. Chan, Q. Zhang, J. Li, P. Parhar, K. Schupak and C. Burman, "The Verification of iPlan Commissioning by Radiochromic EBT2 Films," International Journal of Medical Physics, Clinical Engineering and Radiation Oncology, Vol. 1 No. 1, 2012, pp. 1-7. doi: 10.4236/ijmpcero.2012.11001.