A.L. Boyer
Department of Radiation Oncology, Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305-5487, USA
Technical advances are continuing in the development of the hardware and software available commercially to support the planning and delivery of radiation medicine. This lecture will provide an overview of such advances in four areas. The transfer and handling of textual and graphical information throughout networked therapy departments is advancing rapidly, thanks in part to the development of the DICOM/RT standards. The availability of large capacity servers and fast networks has provided the hardware foundation for this development. The development of intuitive and user-friendly software is now in progress. The simulation process has evolved from fluoroscopic and plane film simulators to CT, MRI, and PET scanners, sometimes configured specifically for radiotherapy treatment planning. Multi-leaf collimators (MLC) have advanced from block replacement to the enabling of intensity-modulated radiation therapy. The associated software and processes, including quality assurance measures, are in a rapid state of flux. Electronic portal imaging devices (EPID) have evolved from high-voltage planar imagers into projection acquisition devices for cone-beam imaging for both megavoltage and kilovoltage reconstructions. These developments are exciting, powerful, and - - - expensive.