Modern palliative radiation treatment: do complexity and workload contribute to medical errors?

Purpose: To examine whether treatment workload and complexity associated with palliative radiation therapy contribute to medical errors.

Methods And Materials: In the setting of a large academic health sciences center, patient scheduling and record and verification systems were used to identify patients starting radiation therapy. All records of radiation treatment courses delivered during a 3-month period were retrieved and divided into radical and palliative intent.

Autocontouring and manual contouring: which is the better method for target delineation using 18F-FDG PET/CT in non-small cell lung cancer?

Unlabelled: Previously, we showed that a CT window and level setting of 1,600 and -300 Hounsfield units, respectively, and autocontouring using an (18)F-FDG PET 50% intensity level correlated best with pathologic results. The aim of this study was to compare this autocontouring with manual contouring, to determine which method is better.

Methods: Seventeen patients with non-small cell lung cancer underwent (18)F-FDG PET/CT before surgery.

PET CT thresholds for radiotherapy target definition in non-small-cell lung cancer: how close are we to the pathologic findings?

Purpose: Optimal target delineation threshold values for positron emission tomography (PET) and computed tomography (CT) radiotherapy planning is controversial. In this present study, different PET CT threshold values were used for target delineation and then compared pathologically.

Methods And Materials: A total of 31 non-small-cell lung cancer patients underwent PET CT before surgery.

Effectiveness of educational intervention on the congruence of prostate and rectal contouring as compared with a gold standard in three-dimensional radiotherapy for prostate.

Purpose: To examine effects of a teaching intervention on precise delineation of the prostate and rectum during planning of three-dimensional conformal radiotherapy (3D-CRT) for prostate cancer.

Methods And Materials: A pretest, posttest, randomized controlled group design was used. During pretest all participants contoured prostate and rectum on planning CT.