Knowledge-based planning in nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Abstract

Radiotherapy planning for treatment of nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) could be challenging and tedious. Both planning quality and time are vastly operator dependent and a high level of skill and experience is required to yield an optimal plan. Various knowledge-based planning (KBP) systems have been developed lately to automate planning based on past treatment plan data, with the aims of improving the planning efficiency and consistency. In this article, we will briefly review the various types of KBP systems, their clinical uses and performances in the nasopharynx site. To give a more concrete example to how KBP can be implemented in practice, we will demonstrate the application of RapidPlanTM (RP)—a knowledge-based optimization toolbox available in the Eclipse treatment planning system—to generate high quality intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) plans for NPC planning. Training, fine-tuning and validation of the RP model were described. Uses of KBP for head and neck cancers in general, uses of KBP for purposes other than planning as well as possible future development of KBP will also be discussed.