Studying dose equivalents of radio-sensitive organs in head and neck region during nasopharynx proton therapy using Monte Carlo MCNPX code

In the present work, dose equivalents of radiosensitive organs in head and neck region have been calculated during nasopharynx proton therapy. For this purpose, a middle-size tumor was designed with the use of clinical information, and was then incorporated into the adult male ICRP phantom. According to the medical data, eight radiation paths around the neck were selected. After that, appropriate proton beams for each radiation paths were designed considering the type and thickness of tissues in the beam path. Since both of soft tissue and bone are existed in pathways of radiation, firstly, the effect of the existence of bone tissue in the path of protons on the position of the Bragg peak was studied. Results showed that when the thickness of bone tissue within the phantom increased by 1 cm, the Bragg peak was pulled back about 0.6 to 0.8 cm. It was also found that the displacement of the Bragg peak by increasing the bone thickness follows a polynomial function for each proton energy. Considering the thickness of the tumor, optimized SOBP were designed for each of eight directions. Finally, doses to different sensitive organs of head and neck region were computed in terms of the therapeutic dose of the tumor. Results indicated that thyroid and brain received higher doses in comparison with other organs.