Streamlining Regulatory Activities Within Radiation Therapy Departments Using QATrack.

Radiation therapy departments are faced with the challenge of tracking numerous quality control tests as well as monitoring service events affecting radiation therapy treatment units. Service events, in particular, pose a challenge since the clinic must be able to provide evidence to the regulatory body that both the service work and any required follow-up tests were recorded and authorized by the appropriate staff. This article presents an integrated approach to tracking quality control tests and service event logs using QATrack+. The newly developed version of this quality assurance software integrates quality control tracking with the service event log, allowing a direct link between a service event and any initiating routine tests or follow-up tests that are performed. This improves the ability of a licensee to ensure compliance with regulations and permits a simple platform from which to access all machine equipment tests and service events. Furthermore, this improves the ability of a department to assess the service record of equipment and to identify trends in failure modes.

Exons 19 and 21 of epidermal growth factor receptor are highly conserved in squamous cell cancer of the head and neck.

Objective. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase inhibition (TKI) is a promising treatment in upper aerodigestive malignancies. EGFR inhibitors might be more effective in patients whose tumors harbor specific EGFR mutations. The presence of specific EFGR mutations is predictive of over a 75% response rate to TKI therapies as compared to 10% in wild type cases of non-small cell lung cancer. Our objective was to examine whether these mutations might occur in upper aerodigestive cancers. Design. DNA was extracted from 20 head and neck squamous cell tumors and 4 squamous cell carcinoma cell lines and sequenced the receptor using published primer pairs. We then compared the results against published mutations. Results. No exon 19 or 21 mutations were found in any of the 20 tumors and 0 of 4 cell lines. Based on the tumor data we would predict that no greater than 8% of head and neck tumors (CI 97.5%) would be likely to harbor either of these mutations. Conclusions. Our findings are comparable to results recently published of Korean, Austrian, and Spanish patient populations and we conclude that exon 19 and 21 EGFR mutations are not more common in head and neck cancer than in nonsmall-cell carcinoma.

Enhancing VHA's mission to improve veteran health: synopsis of VHA's Malcolm Baldrige award application.

The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) provides health care value to an aging veteran population in the midst of rising health care costs and the necessity to demonstrate improvements in the quality of care. The Malcolm Baldrige framework offers a comprehensive assessment of the organization's management system, performance improvements, and the promise to enhance health outcomes, including quality and patient satisfaction. This article will describe the development, current status, and future plans within VHA for the Malcolm Baldrige Award for Healthcare.