International journal of radiation oncology, biology, physics
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Int. J. Radiat. Oncol. Biol. Phys. · Nov 2009
Quantifying interfraction and intrafraction tumor motion in lung stereotactic body radiotherapy using respiration-correlated cone beam computed tomography.
Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) is an effective treatment for medically inoperable Stage I non-small-cell lung cancer. However, changes in the patient's breathing patterns during the course of SBRT may result in a geographic miss or an overexposure of healthy tissues to radiation. However, the precise extent of these changes in breathing pattern is not well known. We evaluated the inter- and intrafractional changes in tumor motion amplitude (DeltaM) over an SBRT course. ⋯ The inter- and intrafractional DeltaM that occur during a course of lung SBRT are small. However, abdominal compression causes larger variations in the time spent on the treatment couch and in the inter- and intrafractional DeltaM values.