From the October 2012 issue of HealthCare Business News magazine


MITA has rallied around an industry-wide initiative to develop and provide additional patient protection features for radiation therapy treatment and planning. This in cludes minimum standards for training and education, but is also integrating appropriateness criteria into decisionmaking, creating a national dosage registry and developing operational and safety procedures and checklists to reduce medical errors.

In an e-mail statement to DOTmed News, Elekta says it has designed many tools for medical physicists and radiation therapists to check the performance and accuracy of the therapy. One is called MOSAIQ Oncology Information. It enables real-time data access that centralizes the patient’s electronic medical record and subsequently facilitates and coordinates the treatment process from referral to therapy. The system can also interface and integrate with systems across the oncology spectrum, according to Elekta.


Reimbursement cuts may be on the horizon
Like many advanced imaging modalities, radiation therapy has recently come under scrutiny from the federal government. In July, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services proposed cuts for certain radiation therapy treatments under the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFP) for 2013. According to ASTRO, these cuts are aimed at IMRT and SBRT reimbursements at freestanding centers.

Shortly after hearing about the news, ASTRO sent out a special alert to members, highlighting the impact these cuts will have on radiation oncology. According to ASTRO (and other groups like MITA who are fighting back), CMS based the proposed reimbursement levels on information in patient literature, which does not include all the preparation work required for radiation treatment.

“They are just thinking of the time it takes to deliver the dose. But there’s an enormous amount of preparation and planning that goes into the procedure,” says Vastagh.

ASTRO is leading an initiative to convince CMS to reconsider the cuts. Several members of Congress have joined in to support the effort. The final Medicare rule is expected this month.

Radiation therapy gains with imaging
Despite these challenges, Huntzinger says that radiation oncology will continue to be a “consumer of imaging.”

“There is a tremendous amount of opportunity using MR sim [simulation]; I’m starting to see some of the early centers talk more and more about doing MR guidance and MR sim,” he says.

While Siemens exited the linear accelerator market earlier this year and partnered with Varian to collaborate on radiation therapy solutions, the company sees an opportunity for its recently released Biograph mMR hybrid PET/MR in radiation oncology. As of August 18, cervical cancer patients have been imaged with the system at Washington University’s Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology for an ongoing research study.

October 2012 Magazine

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