At the 2012 Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS) Annual Meeting (Chicago, USA, 6–10 October), Elekta and Brainlab announced a collaboration which will enable neurosurgeons and radiation oncologists to use Brainlab’s iPlan software together with Elekta’s Leksell GammaPlan treatment planning for Gamma Knife radiosurgery.
Through the collaboration, clinicians will be given the option to add the functionality of iPlan RT Image to the optimised dosimetry and precision of Leksell GammaPlan treatment planning. iPlan, including multimodality image fusion, contouring, atlas-based auto segmentation, fiber tracking and BOLD fMRI analysis, brings additional tools to account for organs-at-risk and other important anatomical and functional structures in the brain.
University of California San Francisco (UCSF) is the first institution to use iPlan pre-planning functionality with Leksell GammaPlan. Andrew T Parsa UCSF professor and vice chairman of Neurological Surgery commented: “We are very excited at the possibility to complement our Gamma Knife radiosurgery treatment planning with advanced software features that have already provided an impact within our surgical environment.”
“With the iPlan RT data enrichment enabled for GammaPlan, we get additional tools to optimise functional sparing and the best ablative treatment for tumours,” said Igor J Barani, UCSF Clinical Research director and vice chair, Department of Radiation Oncology.
“iPlan offers additional options to prepare data for treatment planning in GammaPlan. Many Gamma Knife users are already familiar with iPlan, and may now choose to also use the pre-planning tools in conjunction with Gamma Knife radiosurgery. In addition, this collaboration enables neurosurgeons who use Brainlab navigation to interact more easily with Gamma Knife radiosurgery,” said Åsa Hedin, executive vice president, Elekta Neuroscience.
