Radiotherapy Solutions

Radiotherapy is a treatment modality used in approximately half of all cancer cases to target and kill cancerous cells.^1,2 Protecting healthy cells in the process remains a challenge, and providers have adopted accessories—such as applicators, alignment tools, patient immobilization, and energy modulating devices like boluses—to help accurately deliver treatment. Traditionally, these accessories have been designed and fabricated by medical physicists, dosimetrists, or radiation oncologists in a clinic or hospital, and while they improve treatment, producing the devices can be burdensome for providers, and accuracy and repeatability can vary over multiple treatment fractions.

To overcome these challenges, 3D Systems began investigating ways to design and manufacture suitable patient-specific accessories. Our team focused on developing an end-to-end service for biocompatible 3D printed boluses that conform to complex anatomies. A bolus is intended to be used with external beam radiotherapy and sit on the patient’s skin to bring the radiation dose closer to the surface of the patient. The current solution has been to take a flat, 1 cm thick sheet of rubber-like material and tape it to the patient’s body. This works for flat anatomies, but taping thick material over a patient’s nose, ears, or hands is difficult. We were determined to develop a better option that would be more flexible and adaptable.