Aplicación de SPEA2 al cálculo de esquemas de dosificación para el tratamiento quimioterapéutico del cáncer

Abstract

This paper presents the application of SPEA2 to calculate optimal dosage schemes for the chemotherapeutic treatments of tumors, where such schemes consists in the specification of several cytotoxic agents, its frequencies and doses to be administered. In this optimization problem, the calculated schedules should optimize more than one objective at the same time: not only tumor size but also the toxicity that remains after the treatment, cost, etc. SPEA2 is a genetic algorithm that applies the Pareto optimality criterion to calculate an approximation to the Pareto frontier, from which the user can choose the "best" or more appropriate solution. In this work a software tool was developed: SoT-Q. It has two main modules: an optimizer that calculates optimal dosage schemes and a simulator that applies these schedules to a simulated patient with a tumor; the functioning of the simulator is based on a pharmacodynamic model to represent the tumor. In the future, once SoT-Q is extensively tested and debugged, this computer program could assist oncologists in decision making about chemotherapy treatments; it could also serve as a teaching aid in training new health professionals. Results obtained using this tool were very good; in all test cases, both tumor size and residual toxicity at the end of treatment were reduced significantly; even more, in some examples the reduction was of three orders of magnitude.