The research team from the Department of Electronics and Computer Science at the University of Granada (UGR), together with the Department of Radiology at the Hospital Virgen de las Nieves in Granada, have designed a portable and low-cost device which can measure the ionizing radiation someone is exposed to, for example, during radiotherapy.
Ionizing radiations play a vital role in the treatment and diagnosis of malignant neoplastic illnesses as well as in the diagnosis of other pathologies. However, according to Manuel Vilches Pacheco from the Medical Physics and Radiology Department at the Hospital Virgen de las Nieves in Granada, “the potential harm ionizing radiations can cause means that, in order to obtain clinical benefits and reduce the onset of unwanted adverse effects as much as possible, they must be used under strict quality control”.
According to experts, this is why it is important to develop instruments which can verify the final result by carrying out a direct follow-up of treatments administered to patients, such as image registration (portal imaging system) or the in vivo measurement of the exact dose administered to patients.
In vivo Control
Portal imaging systems have greatly improved in the last five years and are widely used today. This is not the case for systems used for in vivo dose measurement in vivo which, in a significant number of patients and treatment sessions, “has been limited to a few centres”. This is because a great amount of effort is required to place the device onto the patient and as it interferes noticeably with the treatment “it can considerably modify the distribution of the administered dose”.