Measuring radiation dose in the vicinity of prosthesis in cancer patients using a 3D radiation dosimeter

With time new techniques have been developed to treat various diseases and new technologies have always played a big role in the better treatment of patients. This project focuses on cancer patients who are being treated with radiotherapy. So the question arises what would be the problem with this kind of treatment. The issue is that there are some cancer patients who already have a metal prosthesis in some part of their body prior to the treatment. Now, if the tumour is in the surrounding area of the implant, that would need to be treated with radiotherapy, then there is the chance of some deviation in the radiation dose delivered. This can affect the entire treatment for the patient and there are possibilities for the treatment to not be as efficient as desired. Therefore, this project aims to measure the radiation dose in the surroundings of the metal implant. So a radiation dosimeter, also called phantom, would be made of Flexydos3D. This was used for investigating the problem. Access to a linear accelerator was required for irradiating the phantom at Royal North Shore Hospital. The measurements were taken using an optical scanner. Another important investigation carried out in this project was regarding the effect of temperature on the Flexydos gel over time which shed some light on where to store the phantoms before and after irradiation.