Program Information
Normalized Mean Glandular Dose Values for Dedicated Breast CT Using Realistic Breast-Shaped Phantoms
A Hernandez1*, J Boone2 , (1) Department of Radiology, Biomedical Engineering Graduate Group, University of California Davis, Sacramento, CA 95817 (2) Departments of Radiology and Biomedical Engineering, Biomedical Engeering Graduate Group, University of California Davis, Sacramento, CA 95817
Presentations
SU-F-I-1 (Sunday, July 31, 2016) 3:00 PM - 6:00 PM Room: Exhibit Hall
Purpose: To estimate normalized mean glandular dose values for dedicated breast CT (DgN-CT) using breast CT-derived phantoms and compare to estimations using cylindrical phantoms.
Methods: Segmented breast CT (bCT) volume data sets (N=219) were used to measure effective diameter profiles and were grouped into quintiles by volume. The profiles were averaged within each quintile to represent the range of breast sizes found clinically. These profiles were then used to generate five voxelized computational phantoms (V1, V2, V3, V4, V5 for the small to large phantom sizes, respectively), and loaded into the MCNP6 lattice geometry to simulate normalized mean glandular dose coefficients (DgN-CT) using the system specifications of the Doheny-prototype bCT scanner in our laboratory. The DgN-CT coefficients derived from the bCT-derived breast-shaped phantoms were compared to those generated using a simpler cylindrical phantom using a constant volume, and the following constraints: (1) Length=1.5*radius; (2) radius determined at chest wall (Rcw), and (3) radius determined at the phantom center-of-mass (Rcm).
Results: The change in Dg-NCT coefficients averaged across all phantom sizes, was -0.5%, 19.8%, and 1.3%, for constraints 1-3, respectively. This suggests that the cylindrical assumption is a good approximation if the radius is taken at the breast center-of-mass, but using the radius at the chest wall results in an underestimation of the glandular dose.
Conclusion: The DgN-CT coefficients for bCT-derived phantoms were compared against the assumption of a cylindrical phantom and proved to be essentially equivalent when the cylinder radius was set to r=1.5/L or Rcm. While this suggests that for dosimetry applications a patient’s breast can be approximated as a cylinder (if the correct radius is applied), this assumes a homogenous composition of breast tissue and the results may be different if the realistic heterogeneous distribution of glandular tissue is considered.
Funding Support, Disclosures, and Conflict of Interest: Research reported in this paper was supported in part by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health under award R01CA181081. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institue of Health.
Contact Email: