Comparison study of the partial-breast irradiation techniques: Dosimetric analysis of three-dimensional conformal radiation therapy, electron beam therapy, and helical tomotherapy depending on various tumor locations

The partial-breast irradiation (PBI) technique, an alternative to whole-breast irradiation, is a beam delivery method that uses a limited range of treatment volume. The present study was designed to determine the optimal PBI treatment modalities for 8 different tumor locations. Treatment planning was performed on computed tomography (CT) data sets of 6 patients who had received lumpectomy treatments. Tumor locations were classified into 8 subsections according to breast quadrant and depth. Three-dimensional conformal radiation therapy (3D-CRT), electron beam therapy (ET), and helical tomotherapy (H-TOMO) were utilized to evaluate the dosimetric effect for each tumor location. Conformation number (CN), radical dose homogeneity index (rDHI), and dose delivered to healthy tissue were estimated. The Kruskal-Wallis, Mann-Whitney U, and Bonferroni tests were used for statistical analysis. The ET approach showed good sparing effects and acceptable target coverage for the lower inner quadrant—superficial (LIQ-S) and lower inner quadrant—deep (LIQ-D) locations. The H-TOMO method was the least effective technique as no evaluation index achieved superiority for all tumor locations except CN. The ET method is advisable for treating LIQ-S and LIQ-D tumors, as opposed to 3D-CRT or H-TOMO, because of acceptable target coverage and much lower dose applied to surrounding tissue.