**6. Designed phantom**

The majority of the commercially available phantoms are of homogeneous density, whereas the actual human body is a complex medium of different density patterns [14]. Additionally, the very few heterogeneous phantoms, which are available commercially (e.g. anthropomorphic phantom) are very costly and are not procured by most radiotherapy centers, especially in developing countries. It is known that human body is composed of fat, tissue, bones, and air cavities having different electron densities that influence the interaction of photon and electron energy deposition affecting the dose delivery to a target volume. Therefore, this study was conducted to develop an indigenous heterogeneous pelvic phantom similar to the patient's anatomy and perform a pretreatment verification in a realistic clinical scenario to obtain reproducible dosimetry.
