I presented a work on the use of microdiamond dosimeters, a dosimeter we developed at the University of Rome Tor Vergata and now is a commercial device.
Can you explain what it is?
It’s a dosimeter to measure the dose which is delivered to the patient in radiotherapy treatment. In this conference I present a work to the use of this dosimetry in hadron therapy and in particular in carbon ion beam therapy. This therapy is performed in a few institutes in the world and in particular in Italy at the National Centre for Hadron Therapy that now is in Pavia in Italy.
How does the device work?
This device is a diamond device, it’s a diamond chip, it’s a diode that measures the dose that the accelerator is delivering so that it transforms the ionisation produced by the radiation into an electrical signal. With this device, there are many different devices for the characterisation m-beam, you can characterise the beam so you can calibrate your accelerator, you will know what will be the dose that you will deliver to the patient.
Are you working with protons or carbon ions?
The device was initially designed for standard radiation therapy with photons and with electrons. Now there are new emerging techniques such as protons and carbon ions which are able to better define the localised dose to the cancer cells without delivering dose to the tissue. This device is utilised to precisely determine the dose.
Do you have clinical data?
The Pavia centre treats many patients, I don’t know exactly what is the number of patients they treat. In any case, this is a system to calibrate the accelerator and it’s very important that all the centres all over the world can precisely determine the dose that they deliver to the patient, first of all, in order to avoid problems over radiation and so on. But it’s also important to have a precise determination in order to compare the clinical results. After many treatments you can compare the results, you have statistics on the successfulness of the techniques on each different kind of tumour.
Who are you working with to test this proton therapy?
I made some tests also, different tests, in different centres for proton therapy. In Catania there is another centre with carbon ions and proton therapy for tumours of the eye and we worked also with Loma Linda University in the US and with PSI in Switzerland. And we worked with many hospitals for photons, radiation therapy, with many hospitals in Rome, in Italy and around the world.
