Authors: Hodaka Numasaki Masamichi Nishio Hiroshi Ikeda Kenji Sekiguchi Norihiko Kamikonya Masahiko Koizumi Masao Tago Yutaka Ando Nobuhiro Tsukamoto Atsuro Terahara Katsumasa Nakamura Tetsuo Nishimura Masao Murakami Mitsuhiro Takahashi Teruki Teshima Japanese Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology Database Committee
Publish Date: 2012/09/28
Volume: 18, Issue: 5, Pages: 775-783
Abstract
The structure of radiation oncology in designated cancer care hospitals in Japan was surveyed in terms of equipment personnel patient load and geographic distribution and compared with the structure in other radiotherapy facilities and the previous surveyDesignated cancer care hospitals accounted for 500 of all the radiotherapy facilities in Japan The patterns of equipment and personnel in designated cancer care hospitals and the other radiotherapy facilities were respectively as follows linear accelerators per facility 14 and 10 dualenergy function 786 and 613 threedimensional conformal radiotherapy function 885 and 700 intensitymodulated radiotherapy function 516 and 253 annual number of patients per linear accelerator 3013 and 1852 Ir192 remotecontrolled afterloading systems 318 and 42 and average number of fulltime equivalent radiation oncologists per facility 18 and 08 Compared with the previous survey the ownership ratio of equipment and personnel improved in both designated cancer care hospitals and the other radiotherapy facilities Annual patient loads per fulltime equivalent radiation oncologist in the designated cancer care hospitals and the other radiotherapy facilities were 2255 and 2476 respectively These values exceeded the standard guidelines level of 200The structure of radiation oncology in designated Japanese cancer care hospitals was more mature than that in the other radiotherapy facilities There is still a shortage of personnel The serious understaffing problem in radiation oncology should be corrected in the futureThis study was supported by the Japanese Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology and GrantsinAid for Cancer Research H223rd Term Cancer ControlGeneral043 and H233rd Term Cancer ControlGeneral007 from the Ministry of Health Labor and Welfare of Japan and by GrantsinAid for Scientific Research from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Sciences No 23591838 We would like to express our appreciation to all ROs and radiotherapy technologists throughout Japan who participated in this survey for providing us with valuable information to make this study possible This study was supported by JASTRO
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