2Department of Medical Physics, Bozlu Holding, Istanbul-Turkey
3Department of Radiation Oncology, University of Acibadem Faculty of Medicine, Istanbul-Turkey
4Department of Radiation Oncology, Istanbul Medicana International Hospital, Istanbul-Turkey
5Istanbul Bilgi University, Vocational Faculty of Health Services, Istanbul-Turkey
6Department of Radiation Oncology, University of Erciyes Faculty of Medicine, Kayseri-Turkey
7Department of TUSEB (Presidency of Turkish Health Institutes), Health Institute of Turkey, Istanbul-Turkey DOI : 10.5505/tjo.2021.2896 OBJECTIVE
Radiotherapy is a costly treatment that requires the proper use of human and financial resources. In any country, the radiation therapy equipment and workforce should be well planned for the appropriate use of resources and radiotherapy treatments. For proper planning, the current situation should be assessed and prepared for the targets to be achieved. This study aims to determine the current status of radiotherapy devices and the workforce in Turkey.
METHODS
Questions were sent to 141 centers to evaluate the number of devices, technical specifications, date of
manufacture and the number of radiation oncologists, medical physicists, and radiotherapy technicians
by Turkish Medical Physics Association. The responses from the centers were analyzed by region and
compared with the situation in other countries.
RESULTS
The data collected in the study are from December 2019. The rate of radiotherapy devices in Turkey according
to population is estimated to be 3.14 megavoltage (MV) external devices per 1 million people.
The distribution is not homogeneous in all regions. The highest value is 4.59 in the Central Anatolia
region, and the lowest is 0.78 in the Eastern Anatolia region. For each MV device, on average, there are
1.58 specialists in medical physics.
CONCLUSION
Our study has shown that Turkey has made significant progress in terms of radiotherapy equipment and
workforce in the past decade. Nevertheless, although Turkey did not reach the standards of high-income
European countries, it is comparable to middle-income countries.