Effect of gastrointestinal gas on the temperature distribution in pancreatic cancer hyperthermia treatment planning

Purpose: In pancreatic cancer treatment, hyperthermia can be added to increase efficacy of chemo- and/or radiotherapy. Gas in stomach, intestines and colon is often in close proximity to the target volume. We investigated the impact of variations in gastrointestinal gas (GG) on temperature distributions during simulated hyperthermia treatment (HT). Methods: We used sets of one CT and eight cone-beam CT (CBCT) scans obtained prior to/during fractionated image-guided radiotherapy in four pancreatic cancer patients. In Plan2Heat, we simulated locoregional heating by an ALBA-4D phased array radiofrequency system and calculated temperature distributions for (i) the segmented CT (sCT), (ii) sCT with GG replaced by muscle (sCT0), (iii) sCT0 with eight different GG distributions as visible on CBCT inserted (sCTCBCT). We calculated cumulative temperature-volume histograms for the clinical target volume (CTV) for all ten temperature distributions for each patient and investigated the relationship between GG volume and change in ΔT50 (temperature increase at 50% of CTV volume). We determined location and volume of normal tissue receiving a high thermal dose. Results: GG volume on CBCT varied greatly (9-991 cm3). ΔT50 increased for increasing GG volume; maximum ΔT50 difference per patient was 0.4–0.6 °C. The risk for GG-associated treatment-limiting hot spots appeared low. Normal tissue high-temperature regions mostly occurred anteriorly; their volume and maximum temperature showed moderate positive correlations with GG volume, while fat-muscle interfaces were associated with higher risks for hot spots. Conclusions: Considerable changes in volume and position of gastrointestinal gas can occur and are associated with clinically relevant tumor temperature differences.