[ RadSafe ] Medical Physics Procedures

[Jose Julio Rozental]

Dear colleagues a recent IAEA document with special interested to medical physics aspects of the operation of radiotherapy hospitals in Member States. 

Jose Julio Rozental                                                                                                                                              joseroze at netvision.net.il                                                                                                                                                             Israel

On-site Visits to Radiotherapy Centres: Medical Physics Procedures

Quality Assurance Team for Radiation Oncology

(QUATRO)

IAEA-TECDOC-1543 , MARCH 2007

http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/te_1543_web.pdf

....................................

"Although vital for the radiotherapy process, accurate beam dosimetry and treatment planning alone

cannot guarantee the successful treatment of a patient. The quality assurance (QA) of the entire

radiotherapy process has to be taken into account. Hence, a new approach has been developed and

named 'Quality Assurance Team for Radiation Oncology (QUATRO)'.

The principal aim of QUATRO is to review the radiotherapy process, including the organization,

infrastructure, clinical and medical physics aspects of the radiotherapy services. It also includes

reviewing the hospital's professional competence, with a view to quality improvement. The QUATRO

methodology is described in the IAEA publication Comprehensive Audits of Radiotherapy Practices:

A Tool for Quality Improvement.

QUATRO, in addition, offers assistance in the resolution of suspected or actual dose

misadministrations (over and under-exposures) in radiotherapy. It includes the follow-up of

inconsistent results detected with the IAEA/WHO TLD postal service and helps Member States at a

very early stage in the problem-solving process, focusing on prevention of incidents or accidents in

radiotherapy.

................................................

This publication describes the audit technique for medical physics aspects of the operation of

radiotherapy hospitals in Member States. The audit methodology was developed by a group of

international experts through a series of IAEA consultants meetings conducted 1999-2005. The IAEA

officers responsible for these meetings were J. Izewska for standardized procedures for resolving

discrepancies in radiotherapy dosimetry and S. Vatnitskiy for the methodology for the auditing of

clinical treatment planning. The IAEA officer responsible for this publication is J. Izewska of the

Division of Human Health."

Questions to Mr. J. Izewska    J.Izewska at iaea.org