A Method for Dose Calculation for High Energy Photon Beams Based on Measurements Performed at Reference Depth

Abstract

An algorithm is proposed to calculate the dose per monitor unit at any point along the beam axis for blocked or unblocked fields. The proposed formalism takes into consideration the beam measurements performed at the reference depth as recommended by most dosimetry protocols (5 cm or 10 cm depending on the beam quality). The only parameters which cannot be measured at the reference depth are the peak scatter factors, but they appear only as a ratio of two peak scatter factors for two slightly different field sizes. A correction factor is proposed when the distance of one shielding block to the beam axis is smaller than 5 cm. An agreement better than 1% has been obtained between calculations and measurements in the range of beam qualities, distances to the source and field sizes defined by typical collimators or shielding blocks, usually encountered in clinical practice.