Dosimetry Effects Caused by Unilateral and Bilateral Hip Prostheses: A Monte Carlo Case Study in Megavoltage Photon Radiotherapy for Computed Tomography Data without Metal Artifacts

BACKGROUND: Hip prostheses (HPs) are routinely used in hip augmentation to replace painful or dysfunctional hip joints. However, high-density and high-atomic-number (Z) inserts may cause dose perturbations in the target volume and interface regions. AIM: To evaluate the dosimetric influence of various HPs during megavoltage conformal radiotherapy (RT) of the prostate using Monte Carlo (MC) simulations. MATERIALS AND METHODS: BEAMnrc and DOSXYZnrc MC user-codes were respectively used to simulate the linac head and to calculate 3D absorbed dose distributions in a computed tomography (CT)-based phantom. A novel technique was used to synthetically introduce HPs into the raw patient CT dataset. The prosthesis materials evaluated were stainless steel (SS316L), titanium (Ti6Al4V), and ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene (UHMWPE). Four, five, and six conformal photon fields of 6–20 MV were used. RESULTS: The absorbed dose within and beyond metallic prostheses dropped significantly due to beam attenuation. For bilateral HPs, the target dose reduction ranged up to 23% and 17% for SS316L and Ti6Al4V, respectively. For unilateral HP, the respective dose reductions were 19% and 12%. Dose enhancement was always <1% for UHMWPE. The 6-field plan produced the best target coverage. Up to 38% dose increase was found at the bone–SS316L proximal interface. CONCLUSIONS: The novel technique used enabled the complete exclusion of metal artifacts in the CT dataset. High-energy plans with more oblique beams can help minimize dose attenuation through HPs. Shadowing and interface effects are density dependent and greatest for SS316L, while UHMWPE poses negligible dose perturbation.