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Background and Objective: Extraoral photobiomodulation therapy (PBM Therapy) is a novel treatment for the prevention of oral mucositis, a painful side effect of myeloablative chemotherapy, and there are no standardized dosimetry protocols for this procedure. We used Monte Carlo modeling to determine optimal parameters for a safe and efficacious treatment. The objective of this work was to experimentally validate the results of Monte Carlo dose modeling of extraoral PBM Therapy by conducting a pilot validation study.
Methods: Light penetration through the right cheek of four volunteers with skin types I-VI was measured. A 69-LED array with an area of 31.2 cm2 was applied to the external cheek delivering 26 mW/cm2 at 850 nm to the surface. Power density at the intraoral mucosa was recorded under a controlled pressure of 18gm/cm2.
To obtain morphological information, we acquired T1 weighted MRI images of the volunteers' heads and measured the thickness of the skin, fat, and muscle layers of the cheek of each volunteer. These anatomical data together with the optical properties from the literature were used to simulate light propagation through the right cheek.
Results and Conclusions: Our study revealed that experimental and simulation results were in good agreement for all 4 subjects. The difference between the mean values of the measured fluence rates was within 16% from the respective fluence rates obtained using Monte Carlo simulations. We confirmed that there was no temperature increase due to illumination. Monte Carlo modeling is a robust and reliable method for PBM Therapy light dosimetry.
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