Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin Clinical Cancer Center is first US site to use Elekta’s Monaco 5 treatment planning with Siemens mARC radiotherapy technique

Clinicians at Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin Clinical Cancer Center are achieving excellent planning results in the first US combination of Elekta’s Monaco® 5 radiotherapy treatment planning software and Siemens’ mARC (modulated arc) therapy technique. The Froedtert & the Medical College team treated their first patient, an individual with prostate cancer, using the combination of Monaco 5 and mARC on March 26.

Milwaukee, WI United States — Friday, May 2, 2014

“mARC is a form of volumetric modulated arc therapy [VMAT], which has significant advantages over step-and-shoot IMRT in radiotherapy delivery speed and/or dose conformity, so we were eager to get mARC working on our Siemens treatment machine,” says X. Allen Li, PhD, Chief Physicist, Department of Radiation Oncologyat Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin Clinical Cancer Center. “The first case was a complex two-arc plan for treating both pelvic nodes and prostate bed, but on pre-treatment verification we achieved 99 percent agreement between the measured dose distribution and the plan dose distribution, which is very good. And, we’ve been able to replicate this accuracy in most of cases measured so far.”

 
Dr. Li adds that the two-arc treatment took eight minutes to deliver, faster than conventional step-and-shoot IMRT delivery. Furthermore, the Cancer Center plans to add flattening filter-free (FFF) beams in this summer, which will significantly speed up mARC delivery.  
 
“Planning mARC delivery with Monaco 5 is straightforward,” states Dr. Li. “From the dosimetrist’s standpoint, there is not much difference planning between mARC and other delivery techniques, so in a sense, workflow is identical.  Having multiple treatment methods in Monaco 5 is a significant improvement over previous versions and the Monaco 5 contouring tools are excellent – we can contour using multi-modality images, such as those from CT, MRI and PET. I also really like the biological-based optimization, which gives us more flexibility in terms of shaping the dose distribution.”
 
Introduced last year, the latest version of Monaco 5 consolidates the best of Elekta’s treatment planning solutions into a single, comprehensive system. A vendor-neutral solution, Monaco 5 allows advanced treatment plans to be created faster and features a completely new user interface. As in all Monaco releases, this new version employs the Monte Carlo dose engine, considered the gold standard for calculating radiation dose.
 
Learn more about Monaco 5 at www.elekta.com/Monaco5. 

 

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About Elekta

Elekta is a human care company pioneering significant innovations and clinical solutions for treating cancer and brain disorders. The company develops sophisticated, state-of-the-art tools and treatment planning systems for radiation therapy, radiosurgery and brachytherapy, as well as workflow enhancing software systems across the spectrum of cancer care. Stretching the boundaries of science and technology, providing intelligent and resource-efficient solutions that offer confidence to both healthcare providers and patients, Elekta aims to improve, prolong and even save patient lives.

Today, Elekta solutions in oncology and neurosurgery are used in over 6,000 hospitals worldwide. Elekta employs around 3,500 employees globally. The corporate headquarters is located in Stockholm, Sweden, and the company is listed on the Nordic Exchange under the ticker STO:EKTAB. Website: www.elekta.com.

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