Program Information

Dose Domain Optimization of MLC Leaf Patterns for Highly Complicated 4Ï€ IMRT Plans

D Nguyen

D Nguyen¹*, V Yu¹ , D Ruan¹ , H Semwal¹ , D O'Connor² , M Cao¹ , D Low¹ , K Sheng¹ , (1) Department of Radiation Oncology, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, (2) Department of Mathematics, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA

Presentations

TU-C-17A-5 Tuesday 10:15AM - 12:15PM Room: 17A

Purpose:Highly conformal non-coplanar 4Ï€ radiotherapy plans typically require more than 20 intensity-modulated fields to deliver. A novel method to calculate multileaf collimator (MLC) leaf patterns is introduced to maximize delivery efficiency, accuracy and plan quality.

Methods:4 GBM patients, with a prescription dose of 59.4 Gy or 60 Gy, were evaluated using the 4Ï€ algorithm using 20 beams. The MLC calculation utilized a least square minimization of the dose distribution, with an anisotropic total variation regularization term to encourage piecewise continuity in the fluence maps. Transforming the fluence to the dose domain required multiplying the fluence with a sparse matrix. Exploiting this property made it feasible to solve the problem using CVX, a MATLAB-based convex modeling framework. The fluence was stratified into even step sizes, and the MLC segments, limited to 300, were calculated. The patients studied were replanned using Eclipse with the same beam angles.

Results:Compared to the original 4Ï€ plan, the stratified 4Ï€ plan increased the maximum/mean dose for, in Gy, by 1.0/0.0 (brainstem), 0.5/0.2 (chiasm), 0.0/0.0 (spinal cord), 1.9/0.3 (L eye), 0.7/0.2 (R eye), 0.4/0.4 (L lens), 0.3/0.3 (R lens), 1.0/0.8 (L Optical Nerve), 0.5/0.3 (R Optical Nerve), 0.3/0.2 (L Cochlea), 0.1/0.1 (R Cochlea), 4.6/0.2 (brain), 2.4/0.1 (brain-PTV), 5.1/0.9 (PTV). Compared to Eclipse, which generated an average of 607 segments, the stratified plan reduced (-) or increased (+) the maximum/mean dose, in Gy, by -10.2/-4.1 (brainstem), -10.5/-8.9 (chiasm), +0.0/-0.1 (spinal cord), -4.9/-3.4 (L eye), -4.1/-2.5 (R eye), -2.8/-2.7 (L lens), -2.1/-1.9 (R lens), -7.6/-6.5 (L Optical Nerve), -8.9/-6.1 (R Optical Nerve), -1.3/-1.9 (L Cochlea), -1.8/-1.8 (R Cochlea), +1.7/-2.1 (brain), +3.2/-2.6 (brain-PTV), +1.8/+0.3 Gy (PTV. The stratified plan was also more homogeneous in the PTV.

Conclusion:This novel solver can transform complicated fluence maps into significantly fewer deliverable MLC segments than the commercial system while achieving superior dosimetry.

Funding Support, Disclosures, and Conflict of Interest: Funding support partially contributed by Varian.


Contact Email: