Objective function based ranking method for selection of optimal beam angles in IMRT

•We propose a new metric for ranking the beam angles in IMRT planning in the order of their optimality.•Employing the beam angles selected using the proposed approach has considerably improved the IMRT plan quality.•The computation time to get optimal beam angles is in the range of 15–25 min. We propose a novel method for the selection of optimal beam angles in Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT). The proposed approach uses an objective function based metric called “target-to-critical organ objective function ratio” to find out the optimal gantry angles. The beams are ranked based on this metric and are accordingly chosen for IMRT optimization. We have used the Pinnacle TPS (Philips Medical System V 16.2) for performing the IMRT optimization. In order to validate our approach, we have applied it in four clinical cases: Head and Neck, Lung, Abdomen and Prostate. Basically, for all clinical cases, two set of plans were created with same clinical objectives, namely Equal angle plan (EA Plan) and Suitable angle Plan (SA Plan). In the EA plans, the beam angles were placed in an equiangular manner starting from the gantry angle of 0°. In the corresponding SA plans, the beam angles were decided using the guidance provided by the algorithm. The reduction in OAR mean dose and max dose obtained in SA plans is about 3 to 16% and 3 to 15% respectively depending upon the treatment site while obtaining equal target coverage as compared to their EA counterparts. It takes approximately 15–25 min to find the optimal beam angles. The results obtained from the clinical cases indicate that the plan quality is considerably improved when the beam angles are optimized using the proposed method.