Evaluation of an automated seed loader for seed calibration in prostate brachytherapy

Abstract

Automated seed loaders for permanent prostate implants are now commercially available. Besides improved radiation safety, these systems offer seed assay capability and ease of needle loading, making preplanned as well as intra‐operative implant procedures more time‐efficient. The Isoloader (Mentor Corp., CA) uses individual I125 seeds (SL‐125 ProstaSeed) loaded in up to 199 chambers inside a shielded cartridge. The unit performs seed counting and calibration using a built‐in solid‐state detector. In order to evaluate the reproducibility and accuracy of the calibration process, two test cartridges were measured with the Isoloader itself and compared with a well‐type ionization chamber (HDR‐1000Plus, Standard Imaging).The air kerma strength measurements for all seeds using the Isoloader had a standard deviation of about 2.7%. For the eight seeds assayed more intensively using both the Isoloader and well chamber, the standard deviations of the measurements for each seed were in the range of 0.8% to 2.8% and 0.6% to 1.3%, respectively. The variation in the Isoloader calibration is attributed to small detector solid angle and bead geometry within seed capsules (verified by radiographs). The reproducibility of the air kerma strength measured by the Isoloader was comparable to that from the well chamber and was clinically acceptable. Seed strength measured with the Isoloader was on average 1%~2% larger than that measured with the well chamber, indicating that the accuracy of the Isoloader was clinically acceptable.PACS numbers: 87.53.Jw, 87.53.Xd, 87.56.Fc

Third‐party brachytherapy source calibrations and physicist responsibilities: Report of the AAPM Low Energy Brachytherapy Source Calibration Working Group

“…Measurement uncertainty in assigning sources to the appropriate bin is expected to make the actual bin width somewhat greater. There are only a few clinical measurements of seed strength distributions, [12][13][14] but the evidence is consistent with a 5% value for two standard deviations at the 95% confidence level. However, if the sample mean is allowed to differ from the manufacturer's value by 3% ͑largely due to combined calibration-coefficient uncertainties between the manufacturer's and user's instruments͒, individual sources will exceed the 5% threshold more than 5% of the time.…”