title: Information technology resource management in radiation oncology.
abstract: The ever-increasing data demands in a radiation oncology (RO) clinic require medical physicists to have a clearer understanding of the information technology (IT) resource management issues. Clear lines of collaboration and communication among administrators, medical physicists, IT staff, equipment service engineers and vendors need to be established. In order to develop a better understanding of the clinical needs and responsibilities of these various groups, an overview of the role of IT in RO is provided. This is followed by a list of IT related tasks and a resource map. The skill set and knowledge required to implement these tasks are described for the various RO professionals. Finally, various models for assessing one's IT resource needs are described. The exposition of ideas in this white paper is intended to be broad, in order to raise the level of awareness of the RO community; the details behind these concepts will not be given here and are best left to future task group reports.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, Iowa City, IA, USA.
authors.forename: R Alfredo
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Siochi
authors.affiliation: UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
authors.forename: Peter
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Balter
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, Washington University, Saint Louis, MO, USA.
authors.forename: Charles D
authors.initials: CD
authors.lastname: Bloch
authors.affiliation: Radiation Oncology Dept., UMass Medical Center, Worcester, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Harry S
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Bushe
authors.affiliation: Radiation Oncology Dept., UMass Medical Center, Worcester, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Charles S
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Mayo
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, Rhode Island Hospital, Providence, RI, USA.
authors.forename: Bruce H
authors.initials: BH
authors.lastname: Curran
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, William Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak, MI, USA.
authors.forename: Wenzheng
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Feng
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Physics, School of Medicine, University of Patras, Rion, Greece.
authors.forename: George C
authors.initials: GC
authors.lastname: Kagadis
authors.affiliation: Global Physics Solutions/Univ. New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA.
authors.forename: Thomas H
authors.initials: TH
authors.lastname: Kirby
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, University of California, Davis Health System, Sacramento, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Robin L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Stern
mesh_terms: D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D020000:Decision Support Systems, Clinical / Q000458:organization & administration*; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006283:Health Physics; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006801:Humans; D019451:Information Management / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D018787:Radiation Oncology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*