Python software for analysis of radiation treatment using
radiobiological model.
Abstract
Introduction: It was a century ago, whether used separately or in
combination with other medicines, that radiotherapy evolved into a
successful cancer treatment. In traditional radiation therapy, a dose
volume histogram (DVH) is utilized for quantitative analysis of the
treatment plan after the adoption of the treatment planning system. An
isodose distribution is also used for qualitative analysis and
evaluation of the treatment plan during this phase. The right treatment
plan is assessed using physical and radiobiological models by in-house
software developed for radiation oncologists. Materials and
Methods: The first process was the OSCAR (Object Scoring with Coloured
Area of Regret) treatment planning system, developed by Theratronics
International, Kanata, Canada in 1991, which was one of the numerous
plan evaluation software programs that were established in the field of
radiation medicine to analyse and regularize the dose distribution. Many
plan evaluation programs have been created over the developing years,
with the commercial software used primarily and the primary inclusion
MATLAB, and very few have been created using Microsoft Visual Basic,
C++, and Java. As a substitute for MATLAB, Python is utilized because it
is freely available and has no commercial value. Results: This
study’s primary objective is to personalize the radiobiological effects
to predict each patient by using the DVH data, which are now accessible,
to improve the overall performance of the prior model. Several
programming languages were initially investigated to check the
portability and quick program execution to illustrate the novel ideas.
It was discovered that Python was adequate for this research even if it
has no economic value compared to other languages. The software receives
the DVH data in text format as an input, and for convenience, it
displays the output using a variety of Python widgets.
Discussion: The major radiobiological parameter values, TD50/5,
slope parameter (m), and volume parameter (n), are used to calculate the
tumor control probability (TCP) and NTCP values of numerous targets and
oars from their respective DVH statistics using Python software. The
evaluation of the physical indices of the treatment plans, the AAPM,
RTOG, and QUANTEC protocols were used in a clinical analysis for the
execution of treatment plans. Conclusion: The problem in the
previous plan evaluation tool was fixed by the custom-made PYTHON
program used for this research investigation, which also added clinical
and radiobiological understanding of the treatment plan. The software
produces a report using Microsoft Excel for the comprehensive
radiobiological and dosimetric plan evaluation study for cancer
patients.