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Recent achievements and activities of the EORTC ROG QART Strategy Committee and Team

The EORTC Radiation Oncology Group (ROG) Quality Assurance in Radiotherapy (QA RT) Strategy Committee and Team would like to provide you with this update on some of its recent achievements and activities.

The EORTC ROG QA RT Strategy Committee and Team have successfully reinforced valuable contacts with other international QA RT groups including the Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG), Trans-Tasman Radiation Oncology Group (TROG), Japan Clinical Oncology Group (JCOG) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

In collaboration with the IAEA, we organized a meeting on global harmonization of QA RT in clinical trials that was held during the International Conference on Advances in Radiation Oncology (ICARO) meeting in Vienna this past April.

We attended two RTOG meetings during which the basis for a QA RT agreement was established for two new cooperative trials: the EORTC-RTOG 40084/22084 intergroup trial, and the EORTC-North Central Cancer Treatment Group (NCCTG) 26081/22086 intergroup trial. Both of these trials will open soon.

A sub-study of the EORTC-RTOG 40084/22084 trial was formed. This sub-study is fully supported by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and will compare the EORTC external reference dosimetry audit (ERDA) policy to the US ERDA policy. ROG has met with the RTOG Advanced Technology Consortium (ATC) and plans to start this 5 year sub-study in January 2010.

We are currently drafting intensity modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) and image guided radiotherapy (IGRT) credentialing guidelines. We are investigating the possibility of having this done digitally instead of physically sending QA phantoms to the various centers, an advance that will save costs.

We organized a new international global harmonization of QA RT meeting that was held during the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology (ASTRO) meeting this past November. During this meeting IMRT and IGRT credentialing were discussed with representatives from IAEA, RTOG, TROG and JCOG.

A new operating procedure has been implemented to estimate QA RT budget as well as to appoint the appropriate QA RT experts to co-write the radiotherapy protocol chapter at an early stage of protocol development. This operating procedure was first implemented for the development of EORTC 62092-2209x retroperitoneal trial being run in collaboration with the EORTC Soft Tissue and Bone Sarcoma Group.

The EORTC ROG QA RT Strategy Committee and Team have accomplished a lot in the past several months, yet much still remains to be done to maintain QA RT standards at a globally acceptable level and to do this in as effective and efficient manner as possible. The EORTC ROG QA RT Strategy Committee and Team would like to thank all of the EORTC Groups for their continued support of QA RT.

Coen Hurkmans
On behalf of the EORTC ROG QA RT Strategy Committee and Team

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