title: Patient handling system for carbon ion beam scanning therapy.
abstract: Our institution established a new treatment facility for carbon ion beam scanning therapy in 2010. The major advantages of scanning beam treatment compared to the passive beam treatment are the following: high dose conformation with less excessive dose to the normal tissues, no bolus compensator and patient collimator/multi-leaf collimator, better dose efficiency by reducing the number of scatters. The new facility was designed to solve several problems encountered in the existing facility, at which several thousand patients were treated over more than 15 years. Here, we introduce the patient handling system in the new treatment facility. The new facility incorporates three main systems, a scanning irradiation system (S-IR), treatment planning system (TPS), and patient handling system (PTH). The PTH covers a wide range of functions including imaging, geometrical/position accuracy including motion management (immobilization, robotic arm treatment bed), layout of the treatment room, treatment workflow, software, and others. The first clinical trials without respiratory gating have been successfully started. The PTH allows a reduction in patient stay in the treatment room to as few as 7 min. The PTH plays an important role in carbon ion beam scanning therapy at the new institution, particularly in the management of patient handling, application of image-guided therapy, and improvement of treatment workflow, and thereby allows substantially better treatment at minimum cost.
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Charged Particle Therapy, National Institute of Radiological Sciences, Inage-ku, Japan. shinshin@nirs.go.jp
authors.forename: Shinichiro
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mori
authors.forename: Toshiyuki
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Shirai
authors.forename: Yuka
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Takei
authors.forename: Takuji
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Furukawa
authors.forename: Taku
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Inaniwa
authors.forename: Yuka
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Matsuzaki
authors.forename: Motoki
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kumagai
authors.forename: Takeshi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Murakami
authors.forename: Koji
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Noda
mesh_terms: D002244:Carbon / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D004867:Equipment Design; D005160:Facility Design and Construction; D063193:Heavy Ion Radiotherapy / Q000295:instrumentation*; D006801:Humans; D007103:Immobilization; D055805:Moving and Lifting Patients; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000532:radiotherapy*; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care; D011880:Radiotherapy Planning, Computer-Assisted / Q000295:instrumentation*; D050397:Radiotherapy, Intensity-Modulated; D012371:Robotics
chemical_list: D002244:Carbon