Assessment of Organ-at-Risk Dose and Treatment Toxicity in Postoperative Radiotherapy for Laryngeal Cancer

This study tested the correlation between radiation delivered to the organs at risk (OARs) and development of treatment-related toxicity for patients undergoing postoperative radiotherapy (PORT) for laryngeal cancer. A retrospective observational study was performed on 30 patients with histologically proven laryngeal squamous cell carcinoma who were treated at Al-Amal National Hospital for Oncology, Baghdad, Iraq. All patients had had total or partial laryngectomy followed by intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) with Monaco v5.11 treatment planning software and Elekta Infinity linear accelerator.

Patients were treated with daily fractions of 2 Gy for 30-33 sessions for a total prescribed dose of 60-66 Gy in 6-7 weeks. Radiation doses to further organs (at risk) had been extracted from treatment planning systems and correlated with toxicities from the treatment. Acute toxicities were defined as those experienced within 90 days after radiotherapy and late toxicities were defined as those experienced beyond 90 days. Statistical analysis was carried out with the SPSS version 29 of which was carried out descriptive statistics and the method of correlation through the method of Spearman for the association of radiation dose and severity of toxicity.