# One medical physicist covering many radiotherapy machines through remote quality assurance

Source: https://onco.cc/ideas/idea-acc-remote-medical-physics-qa/  
OnCo record `idea-acc-remote-medical-physics-qa` (Idea). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Medical physicists, who keep radiotherapy machines accurate and safe, are in even shorter supply than oncologists in under-resourced systems. Routine linac quality assurance is now largely automated and log-file based, so one physicist could review it remotely while trained radiation therapists take the measurements, covering three to five machines once regulators define the supervision standard.

## Summary

Routine linac quality assurance (output constancy, imaging alignment, plan verification) is increasingly automated and log-file based. A physicist can review these remotely while trained radiation therapists perform the physical measurements. Coupled with remote plan checks and periodic on-site audits, this model could let one physicist supervise three to five machines across sites. Regulators and professional bodies would need to define the supervision standard.

## Fields

- Kind: Idea
- Last checked: 2026-09-08
- Hypothesis: A remote-supervision model will maintain IAEA/IROC dosimetry audit pass rates equivalent to on-site physics while reducing the physicist requirement per machine by at least half.
- Rationale: Automated QA and log-file analysis already meet or exceed manual checks in accuracy; the constraint is professional custom and regulation rather than physics.
- Proposed test: Run a two-year pilot in a network of six machines with two physicists, using independent external dosimetry audits and incident reporting as safety endpoints.
- Maturity: early-clinical
- Actor: engineering

## Sources

- Bottleneck evidence (Not enough oncologists, nurses, pathologists, physicists): Yang et al., Projected supply of and demand for oncologists and radiation oncologists through 2025 (JOP 2014): https://doi.org/10.1200/JOP.2013.001319

## Connected records

- ideas: [Round-the-clock remote treatment-planning hubs for clinics without physicists](https://onco.cc/ideas/idea-acc-remote-planning-hubs/)
- fronts: [Radiation Therapy](https://onco.cc/fronts/radiation/)
- technologies: [IMRT / IGRT (modern external beam)](https://onco.cc/technologies/imrt-igrt/)
- bottlenecks: [Most of the world has almost no cancer care](https://onco.cc/bottlenecks/b-global-access/), [Not enough oncologists, nurses, pathologists, physicists](https://onco.cc/bottlenecks/b-workforce/)
- key papers: [Projected supply of and demand for oncologists and radiation oncologists through 2025: an aging, better-insured population will result in shortage](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-yang-j-oncol-pract/)
- roadmaps: [Radiotherapy roadmap: X-rays → shaped beams → fewer fractions, particles and FLASH](https://onco.cc/roadmaps/radiation-roadmap/)

---
JSON: https://onco.cc/api/v1/entities/idea-acc-remote-medical-physics-qa.json