Department of Radiation Oncology

Intensity modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) is especially suitable for tumors with a complex 3-dimensional morphology located in the vicinity of radiosensitive organs.

Multiple radiation fields coming from different directions and with individually modulated intensities converge in the tumor (target volume) forming “dose topographies”. The overlap of all these dose structures results in an even dose distribution in the complex shape of the target volume, while carefully protecting the adjacent radiosensitive organs. The modulation of the intensity of each individual radiation field is achieved by the movable and automatically controlled leaves of the multi-leaf collimator (MLC) within the accelerator.

With the aid of powerful computers the expert team of medical physicists determines the highly complex sequence needed for each patient and treatment plan, which is then validated by extensive measurements at the linear accelerator.