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Semi-automated construction of patient individualised clinical target volumes for radiotherapy treatment of glioblastoma utilising diffusion tensor decomposition maps.

Published version
Peer-reviewed

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Authors

Brochu, Frederic 
Li, Chao 
Sinha, Rohitashwa 
Price, Stephen John 

Abstract

OBJECTIVES: Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is a highly infiltrative primary brain tumour with an aggressive clinical course. Diffusion tensor imaging (DT-MRI or DTI) is a recently developed technique capable of visualising subclinical tumour spread into adjacent brain tissue. Tensor decomposition through p and q maps can be used for planning of treatment. Our objective was to develop a tool to automate the segmentation of DTI decomposed p and q maps in GBM patients in order to inform construction of radiotherapy target volumes. METHODS: Chan-Vese level set model is applied to segment the p map using the q map as its initial starting point. The reason of choosing this model is because of the robustness of this model on either conventional MRI or only DTI. The method was applied on a data set consisting of 50 patients having their gross tumour volume delineated on their q map and Chan-Vese level set model uses these superimposed masks to incorporate the infiltrative edges. RESULTS: The expansion of tumour boundary from q map to p map is clearly visible in all cases and the Dice coefficient (DC) showed a mean similarity of 74% across all 50 patients between the manually segmented ground truth p map and the level set automatic segmentation. CONCLUSION: Automated segmentation of the tumour infiltration boundary using DTI and tensor decomposition is possible using Chan-Vese level set methods to expand q map to p map. We have provided initial validation of this technique against manual contours performed by experienced clinicians. ADVANCES IN KNOWLEDGE: This novel automated technique to generate p maps has the potential to individualise radiation treatment volumes and act as a decision support tool for the treating oncologist.

Description

Keywords

Adult, Aged, Brain Mapping, Brain Neoplasms, Diffusion Tensor Imaging, Female, Glioblastoma, Humans, Male, Middle Aged

Journal Title

Br J Radiol

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

0007-1285
1748-880X

Volume Title

93

Publisher

Oxford University Press (OUP)
Sponsorship
Cancer Research UK (19732)
Cancer Research UK (C9685/A25163)
National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR/CS/009/011)
This study was funded by an NIHR Clinician Scientist Fellowship for a SJP, project reference NIHR/CS/009/011. The research was supported by the NIHR Brain Injury MedTech Co-operative based at Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and University of Cambridge and the NIHR Cambridge BRC. The views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care. Also, RR is supported as part of the CRUK-funded PRaM-GBM study (C9216/A19732). NVIDIA Corporation is gratefully acknowledged for the donation of two Titan X GPUs for our research.