The ABS Physics Committee and Q.M. School faculty are preparing template QA forms for popular LDR/HDR brachytherapy procedures. These forms should not be adopted as definitive solutions to regulatory and institutional procedures but as examples to be adapted to your needs. The forms are available to ABS members by clicking this Brachytherapy QA Forms link. Excel worksheets for radiobiological calculations are also in preparation and are available on the page Brachytherapy Guidelines and Consensus Statements.
While air-kerma strength has been a recommended unit of source strength rather than apparent activity for a few decades, mistakes converting from apparent activity have been made. In coordination with the AAPM, the ABS has recommended NRC rulemaking to transition from antiquated units such as apparent activity to traceable quantities such as air-kerma strength. Furthermore, the ABS has proposed refinements in the NRC's proposed rules for medical use of byproduct material, particularly in the definition of medical events.
In addition to the series of forthcoming ABS reports on practice guidelines for GYN, breast, and prostate brachytherapy, there are several published reports of special interest to the brachytherapy physics community:
All AAPM Task Group Reports are freely available to the public on their website: http://www.aapm.org/pubs/reports/.
Finally, we would like to remind all of our colleagues of the open invitation to attend the Brachytherapy Physics Committee meetings as held during the ABS Annual Meeting as well as the AAPM annual meeting.
