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Abstract

Carbon-ion beam radiotherapy has been developed as a highly effective modality for cancer treatment. Based on the precise dose distributions of carbon-ion treatments, a better sparing of healthy organs surrounding the tumor site compared to the standard photon radiotherapy are provided. However, dose distributions in car-bon-ion beam radiotherapy are more prone to uncertainties. Therefore, strategies to monitor the ion beam during a treatment delivery, ideally directly in the patient, are of great importance. In this thesis, a non-invasive methodology to measure the lateral pencil beam positions in the patient has been developed. It is based on detection and tracking of charged nuclear fragments leaving the treated patient as secondary radiation. The performance of the developed methodology was investigated in patient-like models mimicking clinical situations at the HIT facility in Heidelberg, Germany. Moreover, the developed methodology has been tested for the first time during a real patient treatment. Precision, accuracy and effectivity of the developed method were found to be clinically attractive compared to the maximal accepted uncertainties of 1 mm. Additionally, the beam movement was aiming towards online carbon-ion beam monitoring. This independent beam monitoring methodology is ready to be evaluated on a larger patient group in a clinical study.