Tumor-Treating Fields at EMBC 2019: A Roadmap to Developing a Framework for TTFields Dosimetry and Treatment Planning

Abstract

Tumor Treating Fields (TTFields) are electric fields known to exert an anti-mitotic effect on cancerous tumors. TTFields have been approved for the treatment of glioblastoma and malignant pleural mesothelioma. Recent studies have shown a correlation between TTFields doses delivered to the tumor bed and patient survival. These findings suggest that patient outcome could be significantly improved with rigorous treatment planning, in which numerical simulations are used to plan treatment in order to optimize delivery of TTFields to the tumor bed. Performing such adaptive planning in a practical and meaningful manner requires a rigorous and scientifically proven framework defining TTFields dose and showing how dose distribution influences disease progression in different malignancies (TTFields dosimetry). At EMBC 2019, several talks discussing key components related to TTFields dosimetry and treatment planning were presented. Here we provide a short overview of this work and discuss how it sets the foundations for the emerging field of TTFields dosimetry and treatment planning.