Radiation Oncology Medical Physics Workload calculation: A Change in Current Workload

Introduction: It is an essential activity to quantify the Radiation Oncology Medical Physics (ROMP) workload for a safe, secure and progressive department. Due to the most recent development at Reza radiotherapy and Oncology Centre (RROC), a workload calculator tool is provided.   Materials and Methods: The Project was performed in different sections including acquiring information and system abilities and failures, data processing and analysis, recommending the results to the executive section and, receiving and analyzing the feedback from Radiation Oncology Medical Physicists (ROMPs) employed at RROC.   Results: Based on interview with ROMPs, who are engaged with professional tasks at planning, dosimetry, Brachytherapy, health Physics, commissioning a machine or radiotherapy technique, as well as amount of patients referred to RROC for radiotherapy, a workload for ROMPs was estimated. It has been found that for average of 225 new patients per month, 8.55 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) is required. For a commissioning and running advanced techniques, such as Intensity Modulated Radiotherapy (IMRT), the total FTE for ROMP contribution including, planning and Patient Specific Quality Assurance (PSQA) tasks was also found to be 1.74 FTE for every 10 new cases. The FTE for Brachytherapy tasks with average 78.5 cases per month including cylinder, tandem, tandem & ovoid, and esophagus cases, and linear accelerator maintenance the average FTE were found to be 2.49 and 2.34, respectively. The study shows relying the computer based managerial affairs is able to reduce the ROMP administrative tasks significantly.   Conclusion: A professional administrative study for ROMP section will be able to determine the real, secure and safe workload for the section. The workload of ROMPs strongly depends on the level of the treatment quality and it should be taken into account as a dedicated plan for each department.