Practical and dosimetric implications of a new type of packaging for radiographic film

Recently, Kodak introduced new light-tight packages (vacuum packaging, aluminium layer under black polyethylene and different paper) for their oncology films (EDR-2, X-Omat V and PPL-2). In order to avoid additional uncertainty and to ensure transferability of previously published results, we assessed in this study the effect of the old and new packages on the dosimetric response of EDR-2 radiographic film. Therefore, sensitometric measurements were performed for different film assemblies (new envelope + new paper, old envelope + old paper, new envelope without paper and old envelope without paper). In addition, to assess possible effects of the package on the film depth-dose response, packaged films were irradiated in parallel geometry, and central depth-dose curves were retrieved. For the perpendicular geometry, on the other hand, the effect of the package was assessed at large depth for a high intensity-modulated inverse-pyramid beam. The results of the sensitometric measurements reveal no difference between the packages. However, the white colour of the paper in both the packages induces a dose-dependent increase in optical density (0-0.12) of the film. The depth-dose curves show better reproducibility for the new package and the new paper improves the accuracy of film dosimetry, but despite the company's effort to evacuate the air out of the new envelope, it remains necessary to clamp the films in the phantom for the parallel irradiation geometry. At 5 cm depth, the films irradiated in parallel geometry show an under-response of 3-5% compared to films irradiated perpendicularly. Finally, even at locations of large photon scatter, no filtration effect from the aluminium layer incorporated in the new envelope has been observed for perpendicular irradiation geometry.