Dr. McCollough found the fundamental problem not to be with the technology but with education and training of the technologists, medical physicists, and the radiologists. "The single most important contribution we can make to patient safety is to ensure that all personnel involved in the operation of CT systems meet nationally-prescribed, minimum levels of training and competency. The needed accreditation and certification programs exist, but without mandatory requirements for a consistent level of advanced education, we are allowing, in some cases, minimally-trained personnel to operate extremely advanced medical equipment."

The second panel featured witnesses from industry organizations. One suggestion to improve the safety of medical radiation, from Dr. Tim R. Williams, Chairman of the Board of Directors, American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO), was that device manufacturers implement interoperability standards for vital clinical information to be easily transmitted from one manufacturer's radiation oncology system to another system, across practices, and available at the point of care. ASTRO is, in fact, leading an effort called Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise-Radiation Oncology (IHE-RO) to ensure that radiation therapy technologies from different device manufacturers can transfer treatment information, reducing chances of medical error.


Michael G. Herman, Ph.D., FAAPM, FACMP, of the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM) then offered some specific areas of focus for improving patient safety, including: providing robust education, training and clinical experience for the qualified medical physicist in clinical practice; passing H.R. 3652, "The Consistency, Accuracy, Responsibility, and Excellence in Medical Imaging and Radiation Therapy Act of 2009" (CARE Act); providing national practice guidance in radiation oncology and medical imaging based on consensus and consistent minimum quality standards; establishing a rigorous minimum standard for accrediting clinical practices and specifically including oversight of dose and quality assurance for medical imaging and radiation therapy technology; linking Centers for Medicare & Medicaid reimbursement to practice accreditation for all medical imaging and radiation therapy practices; and creating a national data collection system to learn from actual and potential adverse events occurring in medical radiation use.

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