Prevention of Accidental Exposure in Radiotherapy

Ola Holmberg, Tommy Knöös, Joanna Izewska, Pedro Ortiz

Abstract

While the probability of harm occurring is low in radiotherapy, the consequences of that harm can be grave for the individual patients since they are exposed directly to a very high dose of radiation. The treatment modality of radiotherapy is expected to increase over the coming years and is also expected to continue to spread geographically. These factors make it vital to emphasize the safety-aspects of radiotherapy to health professionals and to ensure that “lessons learned” from incidents can be shared in the radiotherapy community for the benefit of the patients.

Outline of topics

• Basic requirements for radiation protection in medical exposures 
• New technologies in radiotherapy and their implications – what do we need to be aware of? 
• Radiotherapy audit as a tool for quality improvement and incident prevention
• Learning from accidental exposures in radiotherapy
• Minimizing risk of accidental exposures from new radiotherapy technologies
• Safety reporting as a tool for preventing accidental exposures   

Ola Holmberg, PhD, is the head of the Radiation Protection of Patients (RPoP) Unit, Radiation Safety and Monitoring Section, NSRW-Division, at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Vienna, Austria. He is a medical Physicist with long radiotherapy experience from Malmö University Hospital, Sweden, St. Luke's Hospital, Dublin, Ireland, The Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam and Chief Physicist at Copenhagen University Hospital, Herlev, Denmark.

Joanna Izewska, Ph.D, works since 1996 at the International Atomic Energy Agency. She is the TLD Officer in Dosimetry and Medical Radiation Physics Section, Division Human Health and the Head of the Dosimetry Laboratory Unit. She is responsible for the IAEA/WHO TLD postal dose audit service for radiotherapy and involved in other radiotherapy audit programs by the IAEA. Her background is in medical radiation physics, in particular dosimetry and QA for radiotherapy. Her previous professional experience is from the Cancer Center in Warsaw, Poland, MDACC Houston, USA, and University Hospital Gasthuisberg, Leuven, Belgium.   

Tommy Knöös, Ph.D, Head of Medical Physics in Lund , Associate Professor in Medical Physics at Lund University. The department gives service in Diagnostic Radiology, Radiation Oncology and Nuclear Medicine. This also includes the production of 18-F and we supply several hospital with PET-agents. One field of interest is risk management and together with Mrs Mary Coffey (Ireland) and Dr Ola Holmberg (Denmark) initiated the ROSIS group (Radiation Oncology Safety Information System). Member of  the board of ESTRO. 

Pedro Ortiz,  Consultant at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), member of the Spanish Regulatory Body, member of the International Commission on Radiological Protection, within its  Committee on Radiation Protection in Medicine and chairman of its task group on preventing accidental exposure in radiotherapy with new external beam technologies.  Former associate professor in medical physics at the University of Madrid and staff member of the International Atomic Energy Agency for the period 1990-2006, having initiated the programme on Radiation Protection of Patients at the IAEA and conducted it during 2000-2006.