Radiotherapy Equipment and Workforce in Turkey

Abstract

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.