evaluation of dose calculation algorithms accuracy for eclipse, pcrt3d, and monaco treatment planning systems using iaea tps commissioning tests in a heterogeneous phantom

Introduction: the accuracy of dose calculation algorithm (dca) is highly considered in the radiotherapy sequences. this study aims at assessing the accuracy of five dose calculation algorithms in tissue inhomogeneity corrections, based on the international atomic energy agency tec-doc 1583. material and methods: a heterogeneous phantom was scanned using computed tomography and tests were planned on three-dimensional treatment planning systems (3d tpss) based on iaea tec-doc 1583.doses were measured for 6- and 18-mv photon beams with ion chambers and then the deviation between measured and calculated tps doses were reported. the evaluated five dcas include monte carlo (mc) algorithm employed by monaco, pencil beam convolution (pbc) and anisotropic analytical algorithms (aaa) employed by eclipse and superposition (sp), and clarkson algorithms employed by pcrt3d tpss. results: in clarkson algorithm, low and high energy photons indicated 7.1% and 14.8% deviations out of agreement criteria, respectively. the sp, aaa, and pbc algorithms indicated 0.9%, 7.4%, and 13.8% for low energy photon and 9.5%, 21.3%, and 23.2% for high energy photon deviations out of agreement criteria, respectively. however, mc algorithm showed 1.8% and less than 1% deviations at high and low energy photons, respectively. conclusion: the dcas had different levels of accuracy in tpss. some simple dcas, such as clarkson, showed large deviations in some cases. therefore, the transition to more advanced algorithms, such as mc would be desirable, particularly for the calculation in the presence of inhomogeneity or high energy beams.