Patent ID: 8238636

Claim:
A computerized device for generating an exposure plan for irradiating a patient with therapeutic penetrating radiation that interacts with target tissue, which is surrounded by other tissue, to beneficially modify said target tissue, said therapeutic radiation being attenuated by said other tissue, said device comprising: a computer having access to at least one reference data set for a reference body that is independent of the patient but corresponds to a region of the patient containing said target tissue and said other tissue, said reference data set comprising patient-independent information about radiation attenuation for said penetrating radiation; said computer also having access to magnetic resonance data representing a patient magnetic resonance image of said region of the patient; said computer comprising an adaptation unit that adapts said patient magnetic resonance image to said reference data set, to produce an adaptation between the magnetic resonance image and the reference data set; said computer being configured to determine patient-specific attenuation for said penetrating radiation upon passage through the region of the patient, using said adaptation between the patient magnetic resonance image and the reference data set said patient-independent information about radiation attenuation for said penetrating radiation; said computer being configured to generate an exposure plan dependent on said patient magnetic resonance image and said patient-specific attenuation for said penetrating radiation; and an output unit in communication with said computer at which said computer causes said exposure plan to be visually presented.