Bladder accumulated dose in image-guided high-dose-rate brachytherapy for locally advanced cervical cancer and its relation to urinary toxicity

The purpose of this study was to estimate locally accumulated dose to the bladder in multi-fraction high-dose-date (HDR) image-guided intracavitary brachytherapy (IG-ICBT) for cervical cancer, and study the locally-accumulated dose parameters as predictors of late urinary toxicity.

A retrospective study of 60 cervical cancer patients who received five HDR IG-ICBT sessions was performed. The bladder outer and inner surfaces were segmented for all sessions and a bladder-wall contour point-set was created in MATLAB. The bladder-wall point-sets for each patient were registered using a deformable point-set registration toolbox called coherent point drift (CPD), and the fraction doses were accumulated. Various dosimetric and volumetric parameters were calculated using the registered doses, including $r{\text{D}}_{n\text{c}{\text{m}}^{\text{3}}}$ (minimum dose to the most exposed n-cm³ volume of bladder wall), r V_{n Gy} (wall volume receiving at least m Gy), and $r\text{EQD}{2}_{n\text{c}{\text{m}}^{\text{3}}}$ (minimum equivalent biologically weighted dose to the most exposed n-cm³ of bladder wall), where n  =  1/2/5/10 and m  =  3/5/10. Minimum dose to contiguous 1 and 2 cm³ hot-spot volumes was also calculated. The unregistered dose volume histogram (DVH)-summed equivalent of $r{\text{D}}_{n\text{c}{\text{m}}^3}$ and $r\text{EQD}{2}_{n\text{c}{\text{m}}^3}$ parameters (i.e. $s{\text{D}}_{n\text{c}{\text{m}}^{\text{3}}}$ and $s\text{EQD}{2}_{n\text{c}{\text{m}}^3}$) were determined for comparison. Late urinary toxicity was assessed using the LENT-SOMA scale, with toxicity Grade 0–1 categorized as Controls and Grade 2–4 as Cases. A two-sample t-test was used to identify the differences between the means of Control and Case groups for all parameters. A binomial logistic regression was also performed between the registered dose parameters and toxicity grouping. Seventeen patients were in the Case and 43 patients in the Control group. Contiguous values were on average 16 and 18% smaller than parameters for 1 and 2 cm³ volumes, respectively. Contiguous values were on average 26 and 27% smaller than parameters. The only statistically significant finding for Case versus Control based on both methods of analysis was observed for r V_{3 Gy} (p  =  0.01).

DVH-summed parameters based on unregistered structure volumes overestimated the bladder dose in our patients, particularly when contiguous high dose volumes were considered. The bladder-wall volume receiving at least 3 Gy of accumulated dose may be a parameter of interest in further investigations of Grade 2+  urinary toxicity. (paper)