GEC-ESTRO ACROP recommendations on calibration and traceability of HE HDR-PDR photon-emitting brachytherapy sources at the hospital level

Jose Perez-Calatayud; Facundo Ballester; Åsa Carlsson Tedgren; Larry A DeWerd; Panagiotis Papagiannis; Mark J Rivard; Frank-André Siebert; Javier Vijande

doi:10.1016/j.radonc.2022.09.012

GEC-ESTRO ACROP recommendations on calibration and traceability of HE HDR-PDR photon-emitting brachytherapy sources at the hospital level

Radiother Oncol. 2022 Nov:176:108-117. doi: 10.1016/j.radonc.2022.09.012. Epub 2022 Sep 24.

Authors

Jose Perez-Calatayud¹, Facundo Ballester², Åsa Carlsson Tedgren³, Larry A DeWerd⁴, Panagiotis Papagiannis⁵, Mark J Rivard⁶, Frank-André Siebert⁷, Javier Vijande⁸

Affiliations

¹ Radiotherapy Department, La Fe Hospital, Valencia, Spain; Radiotherapy Department, Clinica Benidorm Hospital, E- Alicante, Spain; Unidad Mixta de Investigación en Radiofísica e Instrumentación Nuclear en Medicina (IRIMED), Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria La Fe (IIS-La Fe)-Universitat de Valencia (UV), Valencia, Spain. Electronic address: javier.vijande@uv.es.
² Departamento de Física Atómica, Molecular y Nuclear, Universitat de Valencia (UV), Burjassot, Spain; Unidad Mixta de Investigación en Radiofísica e Instrumentación Nuclear en Medicina (IRIMED), Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria La Fe (IIS-La Fe)-Universitat de Valencia (UV), Valencia, Spain.
³ Radiation Physics, Department of Medicine and Health (IMH), Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden; Section of Radiotherapy Physics and Engineering, Medical Radiation Physics and Nuclear Medicine, Karolinska University hospital, Stockholm, Sweden; Department of Oncology Pathology, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.
⁴ Department of Medical Physics, School of Medicine and Public Health, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA.
⁵ Medical Physics Laboratory, Medical School, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, 75 Mikras Asias, Athens, Greece.
⁶ Department of Radiation Oncology, Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Providence, RI, USA.
⁷ UKSH, Campus Kiel, Klinik für Strahlentherapie (Radioonkologie), Kiel, Germany.
⁸ Departamento de Física Atómica, Molecular y Nuclear, Universitat de Valencia (UV), Burjassot, Spain; Unidad Mixta de Investigación en Radiofísica e Instrumentación Nuclear en Medicina (IRIMED), Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria La Fe (IIS-La Fe)-Universitat de Valencia (UV), Valencia, Spain; Instituto de Física Corpuscular, IFIC (UV-CSIC), Burjassot, Spain.

PMID: 36167195
DOI: 10.1016/j.radonc.2022.09.012

Abstract

The vast majority of radiotherapy departments in Europe using brachytherapy (BT) perform temporary implants of high- or pulsed-dose rate (HDR-PDR) sources with photon energies higher than 50 keV. Such techniques are successfully applied to diverse pathologies and clinical scenarios. These recommendations are the result of Working Package 21 (WP-21) initiated within the BRAchytherapy PHYsics Quality Assurance System (BRAPHYQS) GEC-ESTRO working group with a focus on HDR-PDR source calibration. They provide guidance on the calibration of such sources, including practical aspects and issues not specifically accounted for in well-accepted societal recommendations, complementing the BRAPHYQS WP-18 Report dedicated to low energy BT photon emitting sources (seeds). The aim of this report is to provide a European-wide standard in HDR-PDR BT source calibration at the hospital level to maintain high quality patient treatments.

Keywords: Brachytherapy; Calibration; Dosimetry; HDR-PDR; High energy.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Brachytherapy* / methods
Calibration
Hospitals
Humans
Photons / therapeutic use
Radiotherapy Dosage