Publications by authors named "Laura C Bennett"
Background: The dynamic collimation system (DCS) provides energy layer-specific collimation for pencil beam scanning (PBS) proton therapy using two pairs of orthogonal nickel trimmer blades. While excellent measurement-to-calculation agreement has been demonstrated for simple cube-shaped DCS-trimmed dose distributions, no comparison of measurement and dose calculation has been made for patient-specific treatment plans.
Purpose: To validate a patient-specific quality assurance (PSQA) process for DCS-trimmed PBS treatment plans and evaluate the agreement between measured and calculated dose distributions.
Background: The Dynamic Collimation System (DCS) has been shown to produce superior treatment plans to uncollimated pencil beam scanning (PBS) proton therapy using an in-house treatment planning system (TPS) designed for research. Clinical implementation of the DCS requires the development and benchmarking of a rigorous dose calculation algorithm that accounts for pencil beam trimming, performs monitor unit calculations to produce deliverable plans at all beam energies, and is ideally implemented with a commercially available TPS.
Purpose: To present an analytical Pencil bEam TRimming Algorithm (PETRA) for the DCS, with and without its range shifter, implemented in the Astroid TPS (.
Article Synopsis
- The development of collimating technologies in pencil beam scanning (PBS) proton therapy aims to enhance treatment accuracy by improving target conformity and minimizing exposure to healthy tissues.
- Recent literature categorizes collimators into three types: per-field apertures, multileaf collimators (MLCs), and sliding-bar collimators, focusing on design and planning methodologies.
- Evidence suggests that collimation, particularly in low-energy treatments, significantly improves target conformity but also poses some risks, such as increased secondary neutron production, indicating that careful consideration is needed when implementing collimation in PBS.