Advances in multi-target FOCO for hyperthermia treatment planning: A robustness assessment

One of the main open challenges in hyperthermia treatment planning is the possibility of uniformly shaping the SAR deposition over a target area, while keeping it bounded in normal tissue. This task is even more challenging as dielectric tissues parameters are prone to uncertainties and targets can be large and irregularly shaped. In this respect, an innovative SAR shaping strategy aimed at addressing the above-mentioned needs, the so-called multi-target focusing via constrained power optimization, has been proposed. This approach has been tested using 3D clinical patient models, exploiting Sim4Life as a simulation platform, and the results show the gain attainable by exploiting the proposed strategy and its robustness in the presence of electromagnetic tissue parameter uncertainties.