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Objective:To investigate the current status of radiotherapy personnel and equipment in China, and to provide data basis for scientific allocation and effective use of radiotherapy equipment during the 14 th Five-year Plan period. Methods:From October to December 2020, a group of experts from China Association of Medical Equipment carried out an online questionnaire investigating the basic situation of radiotherapy in China, and the contents of the survey include radiotherapy centers, professional personnel, equipment, technology, equipment utilization rate, forecast of personnel and equipment in the next five years, etc. The data were reviewed by provincial medical societies/associations.Results:There were 1538 radiotherapy centers and 32978 radiotherapy professionals in Mainland China, including 18966 radiotherapy physicians, 4475 physicists and 9537 technicians. There were 2139 linear accelerators, 57 cobalt 60 accelerators, 457 afterloaders, 6 proton/heavy ion machines, 1034 conventional 2D simulators, 1208 CT simulators, and 89 MR simulators. 1459 centers can provide 3D conformal radiotherapy, 1256 centers can deliver intensity-modulated radiotherapy, 514 centers can offer volumetric modulated arc therapy, 422 centers can provide brachytherapy. According to the estimated data reported by the participating centers, in the next five years, the demand of professionals and machines will be increased by 4868 radiotherapy physicians, 2078 physicists and 3796 technicians, and 994 linacs, 896 CT simulators, 313 MR simulators and 54 proton heavy ions.Conclusions:The radiotherapy industry in China grows fast. During the 14 th Five-Year Plan period, the radiotherapy industry still has strong market demand as well as increase demand of personnel and equipment. Strengthening the market competitiveness of domestic radiotherapy enterprises, improving the equipment utilization rate in primary hospitals, providing comprehensive and systematic training and promoting standardized clinical application can resolve the issues of the lack and unbalanced distribution of radiotherapy resources, and maintain the fast and sustainable development of radiotherapy in China.
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Objective To investigate the application status of radiotherapy and nuclear medicine resources in Qingdao, China, and to provide a data foundation for the development of radiotherapy and nuclear medicine in this city. Methods A questionnaire survey was performed on all medical institutions with radiotherapy and nuclear medicine services across Qingdao. The cut off date for questionnaire data pooling was March 31, 2021. Results A total of 18 hospitals have radiotherapy services in Qingdao, including 12 (66.67%) tertiary hospitals and 6 (33.33%) secondary hospitals. There were 29 pieces of radiotherapy equipment in total, including 24 (82.76%) linear accelerators, 4(13.79%) brachytherapy units, and 1(3.45%) helical tomotherapy unit. Among all patients with radiotherapy in Qingdao, 79.68% were treated in tertiary hospitals. Nuclear medicine departments have been set up in five medical institutions in Qingdao, all in tertiary hospitals. There were five PET-CT scanners, seven SPECT scanners, and two cyclotrons in these nuclear medicine departments. Conclusion Qingdao had a higher radiotherapy equipping rate than the national average level, but with an uneven personnel distribution. Some secondary hospitals were short of medical physicists. The penetration rates of nuclear medicine equipment and personnel should be improved.
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It is an important technical means to ensure that the radiodiagnosis and radiotherapy equipment can be put into use normally to carry out acceptance test after the newly installed, maintained or replaced important components. Health inspection found that medical institutions are often easy to ignore the acceptance test in the process of use, and do not carry out acceptance test on the radiodiagnosis and radiotherapy equipment after maintenance or replacement of important components. However, it is difficult to ask medical institutions to correct them without the definition and scope of ‘important components’ according to laws or technical standards. This paper studies and discusses the definition of ‘important components’ of radiodiagnosis and radiotherapy equipment, and puts forward some suggestions onthe practical application of the research results.
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Objective:To investigate the application of radiotherapy and the basic situation of teaching and scientific research in Xinjiang.Methods:A unified questionnaire was adopted, distributed and collected by mail, instant messaging software and telephone. The basic situation of all radiotherapy affiliations in the whole region was counted.Results:The questionnaire coverage rate was 100% with a recovery rate of 100%. In 2020, 17 affiliations operated radiotherapy in Xinjiang, including 23 linear accelerators, 1 cobalt-60 therapeutic machine, 3 gamma knives, 6 post-installed therapeutic machines, 13 special analogue positioning machines, 46 treatment planning systems, and 103 sets of radiotherapy quality control equipment. It was estimated that the number of radiotherapy equipment for one million people in the whole region was approximately 0.84. In Xinjiang, 359 radiotherapy personnel were registered, including 220 physicians, 49 physicists and 90 technicians. A total of 1 270 beds were available, with an average daily treatment volume of approximately 1 255 person-times. From 2016 to 2021, 17 affiliations have undertaken 9 National Natural Science Foundation of China and 49 provincial and ministerial projects. Nineteen doctoral degrees and 87 master′s degrees were accredited. These affiliations participated in the publication of 25 articles in Chinese Journal of Radiation Oncology, of which 18 were published as the first authors and/or corresponding authors.Conclusions:The radiotherapy work in Xinjiang has developed rapidly in recent years, but there is still a certain gap with the national average level. At the same time, several problems still exist in the whole region, such as regional differences, unbalanced allocation of radiotherapy resources and scientific research and teaching resources, which need further improvement.
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The complexity of intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) equipment and the accuracy of clinical radiotherapy require extremely high standards for the, quality control of IMRT for nasopharyngeal carcinoma. Reasonable, reliable and targeted quality control is an essential part of precise radiotherapy. At present, domestic radiotherapy equipment is developing rapidly. Nevertheless, radiotherapy equipment, personnel composition and quality control significantly differ among hospitals. Therefore, it is difficult to achieve homogeneity in the quality control of radiotherapy. Establishing an expert consensus on the quality control of domestic radiotherapy equipment can clarify the content of quality control, testing procedures, testing conditions and personnel qualification and requirement. It can effectively ensure the standardization and homogeneity of the quality control and establish the responsibility, procedures, processes and quality management of the quality control, aiming to offer the optimal radiotherapy to each patient.
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Objective To investigate the physics technique and quality assurance (QA) during radiotherapy in the institutions from the East Guangdong province,aiming to provide reference for the construction of radiotherapy discipline and rational allocation of resources in the primary hospitals from the eastern Guangdong province.Methods From March 15 to May 20,2016,the general conditions,radiotherapy equipment,available technique and quality assurance (QA) in the medical institutions from eastern Guangdong were investigated and analyzed by online combined with on-spot surgery.Results There were 8 institutions which provided radiotherapy with 966 ward beds,a daily capacity of 632 patients and 222 radiotherapy practitioners.Radiotherapy equipment included 12 linear accelerators,5 after-loading devices,1γ-knife,8 CT simulators and 9 radiotherapy planning systems.Five institutions performed IMRT/VMAT,IGRT and ART.Dose verification was performed before precision radiotherapy delivery in all institutions except for 1 center.QA procedures were missing for the linear accelerators,CT simulators and after-loading devices.Short-term advanced studies and hand-by-hand teaching were the main approaches for staff professional training.Conclusions The resource allocation for radiotherapy in the medical centers from the eastern Guangdong province is scarce.The technique and QC levels greatly differ among different institutions.Standard QA protocols are urgently to be established and implemented.Extensive attentions should be paid to the the professional training for technicians.
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Objective In order to evaluate the present status of Radiation Oncology in China,the Chinese Society of Radiation Oncology performed the 6th continent prefecture of China e survey.Methods Questionnaire forms were sent by mail,e-mail,telephone and FAX.Results By August 31 st,2011,there were 1162 radiation oncology centers.There was a total of 30985 employees,including 9895 doctors,1887 physicists,11689 nurses,6103 technicians and 1411 engineers.There were 1296 linear accelerators,286 telecobalt units,81 deep x-ray machine,1040 simulators,376 CT simulators,317 brachytherapy units,1427 treatment planning system,1041 dosimeters,410 X-knife,and 230 γ-knife (122 for head only,108 for head and body).There were 56847 beds for inpatients (4 centers did not report the number of beds).More than 58000 patients were treated per day ( no report from 9 centers ),and 569056 new patients were treated annually (no report from 38 centers).Conclusions Radiation oncology was developed rapidly in the last 5 years,either in personnel,equipment,and new techniques.They are still insufficient in proportion to our population.