Program Information
Energy Dependent Radiation/light-Field Misalignment On Truebeam Linear Accelerator
N Sperling*, S Tanny , E Parsai , University of Toledo Medical Center, Toledo, OH
Presentations
SU-E-T-361 (Sunday, July 12, 2015) 3:00 PM - 6:00 PM Room: Exhibit Hall
Purpose: Verifying the co-incidence of the radiation and light field is recommended by TG-142 for monthly and annual checks. On a digital accelerator, it is simple to verify that beam steering settings are consistent with accepted and commissioned values. This fact should allow for physicists to verify radiation-light-field co-incidence for a single energy and accept that result for all energies. We present a case where the radiation isocenter deviated for a single energy without any apparent modification to the beam steering parameters.
Methods: The radiation isocenter was determined using multiple methods: Gafchromic film, a BB test, and radiation profiles measured with a diode. Light-field borders were marked on Gafchromic film and then irradiated for all photon energies. Images of acceptance films were compared with films taken four months later. A phantom with a radio-opaque BB was aligned to isocenter using the light-field and imaged using the EPID for all photon energies. An unshielded diode was aligned using the crosshairs and then beam profiles of multiple field sizes were obtained. Field centers were determined using Omni-Pro v7.4 software, and compared to similar scans taken during commissioning. Beam steering parameter files were checked against backups to determine that the steering parameters were unchanged.
Results: There were no differences between the configuration files from acceptance. All three tests demonstrated that a single energy had deviated from accepted values by 0.8 mm in the inline direction. The other two energies remained consistent with previous measurements. The deviated energy was re-steered to be within our clinical tolerance.
Conclusions: Our study demonstrates that radiation-light-field coincidence is an energy dependent effect for modern linacs. We recommend that radiation-light-field coincidence be verified for all energies on a monthly basis, particularly for modes used to treat small fields, as these may drift without influencing results from other tests.
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