SU‐E‐T‐441: Comparison of Dose Distributions for Spot‐Scanned Pencil‐Beam and Scattered‐Beam Proton Treatments of Ocular Tumors

Abstract

Purpose:To study the cross‐field and depth dose profiles of spot‐scanned pencil beam configurations for the treatment of ocular tumors and to compare their performance to a simulated scattered beam.Methods:Dose distributions in a cubic water phantom were compared for beams that passed through a final 24mm diameter aperture to deposit maximum dose at 2.4cm depth. The pencil‐beam spots formed a hexagonally‐packed ring with a center‐to‐center spacing of 4mm. The protons exited the nozzle with energy 95.5MeV, traversed a 4.5cm water‐equivalent range shifter, and travelled either 42.5cm or 100cm to the phantom surface. The aperture‐to‐phantom distance (APD) was 5.7cm to allow room for eye‐tracking hardware. A configuration with APD=0 was also tested. The scattered beam was generated with energy 159MeV, passed through 127mm of Lexan, exited the final aperture, and travelled 5.7cm to the phantom surface. This latter configuration is comparable to the MGH single scattered beamline. All beams were modelled with TOPAS1.0‐beta6 compiled with GEANT4.9.6p2.Results:The modeled scattered beam produced a distal fall‐off along the central axis of zd90%‐zd10%=3.6mm. For the pencil beam, the zd90%‐zd10% was 1.6mm in all configurations. The scattered beam's cross‐field penumbra at depth of maximum dose was r90%‐ r10%=1.9mm. For the spot‐scanned configuration with the range‐shifter‐tophantom distance (RsPD) of 100cm, similar cross‐field profiles were achieved with r90%‐r10%=2.0mm. At shorter RsPD of 42.5cm, the crossfield penumbras were 5.6mm and 7.7mm for APD=0cm and APD=5.7cm, respectively.Conclusion:For proton treatments employing a range shifter, the cross‐field and central axis dose profiles depend on the quality of the original beam, the size of the range shifter, the distance from the range shifter exit to the patient, and the distance from the final aperture to the patient. A spot‐scanned pencil beam configuration can achieve cross‐field penumbras equal to a scattered beam and superior distal gradients.