• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.90-97
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• 2002

The simulator which has a identical geometry with radiotherapy equipments, is a essential equipment to accomplish optimized radiotherapy plan through simulation by using diagnostic low energy X-ray. A Radiotherapy simulator has a combined technology from the therapeutic and diagnostic radiology and needs a periodical test for mechanical and optical properties, X-ray generator, image intensifier of simulator to keep the proper maintenance and radiation safety. Hence, tests were done and classified as i) mechanical and optical parameter for the gantry, collimator, and couch ii) key performance of the X-ray generator such as a kVp, mAs, and timer iii) performance of the image intensifier such as a resolution and contrast for three kinds of simulator, common use in clinic. The above result of tests will be applied to the acceptance test and periodical quality assurance procedure.

• Korean Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.134-141
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• 1999

Objects : Cancer patients receiving radiotherapy have many psychological problems. Those problems depend on clinical factors of cancer and the characteristics of patients. This study was designed to estimate the morbidity of psychiatric disorder and to investigate the relationship between psychiatric disorders and clinical variables. Methods : The subjects were 47 patients who had been treated by radiotherapy. Psychiatric disorder was diagnosed according to DSM-IV. The authors assessed the relation between psychiatric disorder and demographic features, clinical features of cancer such as site, duration, frequency of recurrence of cancer, and patients' awareness of disease and expectation of outcome of radiotherapy. Results : 21 patients(44.7%) had a psychiatric disorder. The most common psychiatric disorder were adjustment disorder(66.7%), and the next major depressive disorder(23.8%). There was a significant positive relationship between psychiatric disorder and recurrence of cancer, patients' expectation of poor outcome after radiotherapy. Psychiatric morbidity was significantly low in those who had no evidence of recurrence and who considered radiation treatment as curative. However, site and duration of cancer, patients' awareness about serious illness were not related with psychiatric disorder. Conclusion : Psychiatric disorders are common among cancer patients on radiotherapy. Further clinical attention and effective treatment of psychiatric complication in cancer patients are needed not only for reducing symptoms but for better adjustment.

• Proceedings of the Safety Management and Science Conference
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• 2004.11a
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• pp.439-445
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• 2004

1895년에 독일 뢴트겐에 의해 발견된 이후 X선은 1896년부터 의료목적으로 사용된 기록이 있으며, 한국에 도입되어 진단용X선발생장치로서 환자 진료에 사용하기 시작한 역사는 1911년경부터 조선총독부의원과 세브란스의원에 도입되어 사용하게 되었다. 최근 의학 및 의용공학의 발전으로 방사선을 이용한 진단 기술의 발전과 건강에 대한 국민의 의료욕구가 증가함에 따라 방사선을 이용한 질병의 진단과 치료 방법에서 새로운 기법이 개발되고 그 이용은 지속적으로 증가되고 있는 추세이다. 방사선의 이용은 진단 및 치료에 중대한 이득을 제공하고 있으나 그 이면에는 최적화 및 정당화 되지 않은 방사선의 피폭으로 장애 및 유해요인이 초래되는 것은 부인할 수 없다. 이와 관련하여 방사선을 이용하여 검사 및 치료를 시행함에 있어 피폭선량 최적화를 위한 기술적 노력은 방사선 관계자의 막중한 의무이다.

• Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.61-70
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• 2011

Recent advances in techniques and strategies use to detect cancer in its early stages and to treat it effectively has the survival rate of cancer patients and the number of long-term cancer survivors continually increasing. Unfortunately, many cancer survivors are at risk for various late and long-term effects of cancer treatments including the radiotherapy. Long-term cancer survivors can be also seen for a hospice and palliative care because of cancer recurrence and they are at risk of delayed reactions to radiotherapy. So, the understanding and knowledge of radiation reactions is required for the proper medical diagnosis, management, and coordination of the potential reactions that may occur in these care setting. In effort to increase the survival rate in cancer patients and to decrease the adverse effects of cancer treatment, many clinical studies have been and continue to be conducted. The efforts of these studies have thus resulted in the advancement of cancer treatments. Regrettably, the overall interest in how to manage adverse effects of cancer treatment such as radiotherapy appears seemingly low in clinical practice and its advanced studies as a whole are delayed and deficient. It is imperative that the medical community show an enthusiastic interest in the aftercare of cancer patients and cancer survivors in order to create a complementary integrative approach that will eliminate radiotherapy related pain/discomfort or illness in hospice and palliative care settings.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.31-42
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• 1990

The finding of long lived free radicals produced by ionizing radiation in organic crystals and the quantification of this effect by electron spin resonance(ESR) spactroscopy has proven excellent dosimetric applicability. The tissue equivalent alanine dosimeter also appear appropriate for radiation therapy level dosimetry. The dose measurement was performed in a Rando phantom using high energy photons as produced by high energy medical linear accelerator and cobalt-60 teletherapy unit. The absorbed dose range of the ESR/alanine dosimetry system could be extended down to 0.1 Gy. The response of the alanine dosimeters was determined for photons at different therapeutic dose levels from less than 0.1 Gy to 100 Gy and the depth dose measurements were carried out for photon energies of 1.25MeV, 6 and 10 MV with alanine dosimeters in Rando phantom. Comparisons between ESR/alanine in a Rando phantom and ion chamber in a water phantom were made performing depth dose measurements to examine the agreement of both methods under field conditions.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.209-218
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• 2012

Recently, an adequate number of qualified medical physicist is needed for achieving effective treatment and securing safety to the patient, staff and the public on the course of radiation therapy, since the equipment and the technique of radiation therapy are being developed fast and becoming complex. The studies on medical physics staffing level in United State and European countries were investigated. These results were applied to the domestic situation in order to anticipate indirectly the adequate number of medical physicist in Korea. The current number of medical physicists of 6 (middle to large sized) hospitals in Korea was less than 50% of number recommended in the study. Further detailed research specified on the domestic situation is needed in order to expect adequate number of medical physicist more accurately, and particle beam therapy has to be also considered in the research since the facility site is increasing gradually.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.629-635
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• 2019

In term of the factors affecting psychosocial adjustment of breast cancer patients, their quality of life after surgical operation, radiation, and chemotherapy were systematically meta-analyzed. As a result, their qualities of life of the patients that had radiation therapy was the lowest right after the therapy, and gradually increased after the end of the therapy. However, after six months, their quality of life failed to reach the same level before the therapy. They had depression and side effects the most right after the therapy, and somewhat reduced them after the end of the therapy. In case of surgical operation, the more they were educated, the more they had psychosocial adjustment, and the more they had a medical examination and took out an insurance policy, the more they had psychosocial adjustment. In case of chemotherapy, their cognitive function is influenced so that they have impairments in memory, learning, and thinking stages. Since subjective cognitive impairment has a relationship with depression, it is necessary to monitor depression of chemotherapy patients. Given the results of this systematic meta-analysis, when three types of therapies (surgical operation, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy) are applied to patients with breast cancer, it is necessary to recognize their psychosocial adjustment, depression, anxiety, and quality of life in the nursing and radiation therapy fields and thereby to introduce an intervention program for a holistic approach.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.127-132
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• 2013

The position of the internal organs can change continually and periodically inside the body due to the respiration. To reduce the respiration induced uncertainty of dose localization, one can use a respiratory gated radiotherapy where a radiation beam is exposed during the specific time of period. The main disadvantage of this method is that it usually requests a long treatment time, the massive effort during the treatment and the limitation of the patient selection. In this sense, the combination of the real-time position management (RPM) system and the volumetric intensity modulated radiotherapy (RapidArc) is promising since it provides a short treatment time compared with the conventional respiratory gated treatments. In this study, we evaluated the accuracy of the respiratory gated RapidArc treatment. Total sic patient cases were used for this study and each case was planned by RapidArc technique using varian ECLIPSE v8.6 planning machine. For the Quality Assurance (QA), a MatriXX detector and I'mRT software were used. The results show that more than 97% of area gives the gamma value less than one with 3% dose and 3 mm distance to agreement condition, which indicates the measured dose is well matched with the treatment plan's dose distribution for the gated RapidArc treatment cases.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.241-249
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• 2015

As radiation therapy is one of three major cancer treatment methods, many cancer patients get radiation therapy. To exposure as much radiation to cancer while normal tissues near tumor get little radiation, medical physicists make a radiotherapy plan treatment and perform quality assurance before patient treatment. Despite these efforts, unintended medical accidents can occur by some errors. In order to solve the problem, patient internal dose reconstruction methods by measuring transit dose are suggested. As feasibility study for development of patient dose verification system, inverse square law, percentage depth dose and scatter factor are used to calculate dose in the water-equivalent homogeneous phantom. As a calibration results of ionization chamber and glass dosimeter to transit radiation, signals of glass dosimeter are 0.824 times at 6 MV and 0.736 times at 10 MV compared to dose measured by ionization chamber. Average scatter factor is 1.4 and Mayneord F factor was used to apply percentage depth dose data. When we verified the algorithm using the water-equivalent homogeneous phantom, maximum error was 1.65%.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Medical Physics Conference
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• 2003.09a
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• pp.65-65
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• 2003

목적 : 방사선치료기술이 날로 발전함에 따라 방사선치료계획시스템에 대한 주기적인 정도관리의 필요성은 증대하고 있으나, 국내 실정에 적합한 표준화된 정도관리절차서가 없는 실정이다. 따라서 본 연구에서는 방사선치료계획용 시스템에 대한 정도관리용 고체팬톰을 제작하여 주기적인 정도관리 활용 및 절차서를 제시하고자 한다. 대상 및 방법 : 체윤곽 보정을 위한 삼각기둥 모형 (30cm$\times$30cm$\times$5cm, 30cm$\times$15cm$\times$5$\times$) 및 정형ㆍ부정형, 불균질 측정이 가능한 물등가고체팬톰을 제작하였고, 컴퓨터단층촬영(AcQsim)을 통해 영상을 얻었으며, RTPS(AcQplan)에 입력하여 영상 내 기준점에서의 선량값을 계산하였다. RTPS를 통해 계산된 값의 평가를 위해 동일한 조건하에서 각 기준점에 대한 실제 측정을 이온함을 이용하여 측정하였다. 평가 항목으로는 정방형 조사면, 부정형 조사면, 쐐기 조사면, 불균질 물질 보정, 사방향 조사 등에 대해서 알고리즘별로 수행하였다. 결과 : RTPS를 이용하여 계산된 값과 실제 측정한 값을 비교하여 RTPS의 정확성을 평가한 결과로 합성의 불확도 허용 기준 (3%), 선속 중심축 상에서의 허용 기준 (2%) 등, 선진 각국 및 각 학회에서 권고하고 있는 허용 범위 내에서 잘 일치하였다. 결론 : RTPS는 측정된 심부선량과 선량분포 등 물리적인 인자에 의존하는 제한성이 있고, 실제로 선량계산 알고리즘과 기하학적 변화에 따라 계산값과 측정값 간에 차이가 발생할 수 있었다. 실제 인체의 체윤곽 불균일성과 불균질성을 모사한 팬톰을 제작하여 이용함으로써 다양한 RTPS간의 비교를 통한 치료 선량의 정확성을 평가하고, 방사선 치료의 원활하고 정확한 수행을 위해 실용적이고, 보편적인 치료계획 시스템의 정도관리 방법과 절차서를 수립하는데에 유용할 것으로 사료된다.