Measurement of transit time of a remote after-loading high dose rate brachytherapy source

Quantification of transit time of a remote after-loading high dose rate (HDR) brachytherapy source is important both for accurate treatment planning and for quality assurance checks. In this investigation, an HDR-1000 well ionization chamber and a precision electrometer are used to measure the transit time of the Ir-192 source of a Nucletron Micro-Selectron HDR brachytherapy unit. The charge generated both during source dwelling at a selected position in an endobronchial catheter inserted into the chamber and during source travel to this position from another location at a distance of 0.5 to 10 cm from it was measured. A linear regression analysis of the measured charge as a function of dwell time was made. The interdwell position transit time was calculated from the ratio of the charge intercept and the slope of the straight line obtained from the regression analysis. The values of the effective transit time, which is a combination of interdwell position transit time and dwell time error of the after-loading unit, were found to be 0.03 and 0.45 s for 0.5 and 10 cm separation between two dwell positions, respectively. The average time for 1 cm travel of the source between two dwell positions was found to be 0.022 s, resulting in an average speed of 45.5 cm/s. This simple procedure has the potential to be utilized for routine quality assurance check of the interdwell position transit time of any remote after-loading HDR brachytherapy source.