Quality Assurance

A quality management program consists of what 4 main components?

Quality assurance, quality control, quality planning, and continuous quality improvement

What three topics are assessed when determining the quality of healthcare delivery?

Structure, process, and outcomes

What is the term that describes a set of activities that are completed for a service or product to ensure that it will meet quality standards?

Quality assurance

What type of testing is completed when a new device or piece of equipment arrives to ensure that it meets the agreed upon manufacturers’ specifications?

Acceptance

What are 3 common safety procedures used in quality assurance of external beam radiation therapy equipment?

Radiation protection survey, interlocks, and patient monitoring equipment 

What is completed by a physicist to determine the operating parameters, such as output, field size dependence, and depth dose, of a new machine? 

Machine commissioning

Which of the following is NOT tested daily for linear accelerator QA?

Which of the following has an IMRT tolerance of less than or equal to 2 mm? 

What does TG -142 provide quality assurance recommendations for?

Medical accelerators

What two organizations have become partners to provide accreditation of radiation oncology facilities?

The American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) and American College of Radiology (ACR) 

What percentage should the output constancy of all x-ray energies remain within for an IMRT treatment machine daily QA?

3%

For a remote after-loading system, what must be done before the first use to verify the geometry and positional accuracy of the applicator? 

Autoradiograph 

What are the 4 major sources of uncertainty that are accounted for in TPS QA?

Algorithm Inaccuracy, Inaccuracies of Data Entry, Inaccuracies of Data Output, Inaccuracies in Measured Data

How often should an ionization chamber and electrometer be submitted to an accredited dosimetry calibration laboratory program (ADCL) for calibration? 

every 2 years 

What is the tolerance for the alignment of a CT simulator’s gantry lasers with the center of the imaging plane?

2 mm