Improving patient positioning accuracy for breast cancer radiation therapy by using the infra red based ExacTrac system

We report on a pilot study to investigate for cancer of the breast, the accuracy of patient positioning with the normal standard method (ST) and with the standard method extended with the ExacTrac system (ET). Our work in progress pilot study population consisted of four patients: two positioned using ST and two positioned using ET. The results from the daily electronic portal images showed that with ExacTrac the positional accuracy could be improved by 50% but with a corresponding increase in overall treatment time of about 2 minutes.