Sci‐Sat AM (2) Therapy‐09: Quality Audits of a Medical Physics QA Program

Abstract

Documented radiation incidents world‐wide illustrate the importance of a rigorous physics quality assurance (QA) program. Since the QA program is such an important part of a radiotherapy operation, it should itself be subject to quality audits to ensure its effectiveness. We have been tracking QA activities in a custom database application, and since 2000, have been auditing our QA activities every six months. The audit produces quality indicators of equipment QA and physicist chart‐checking. The compliance rate and effectiveness of our tests are tracked and the information is used to improve our processes. Attention to these indicators has led to improvements in on‐time compliance, which is now typically greater than 95% for QA tests and QA review. Chart‐check activities show a rate of potentially significant problems found of about 3%, which has remained consistent through changes in workload and through major changes in treatment planning software and processes.In this paper we will share some of the observations of QA performance data, and discuss how this data has been used to improve our QA program. We will present some general lessons to be learned about the effectiveness of QA programs, and the human psychology of doing this kind of activity well.