Three-dimensional (3D) printing is suitable for the fabrication of complex radiotherapy bolus. By combining 3D printing technology with patient image data, cancer centres are able to improve accuracy and efficiency of radiation therapy.

Healthcare professionals are always striving to improve three main areas: quality of care, efficiency of care and patient experience.  At the QEII Health Sciences Centre in Halifax, Canada, they have found a way to drastically improve all three — at once.

The 3D printed ancillary radiation therapy devices, called boluses, can be used for multiple indications such as the treatment of patients after mastectomy, in skin cancers and cancers of the head and neck.

Electron beams provide advantages in superficial radiation therapy in that they have a rapid dose fall-off with depth of penetration.  However, conventionally it has been difficult to conform the high dose area to the distal edge of the treatment volume.  Researchers have used 3D printing technology, and patented algorithms to provide a practical and low […]

A new research article by a team of Canadian researchers published in the American Association Of Physicists In Medicine‘s points to potential for 3D printers to soon become standard fixtures in cancer centers.