ELECTRONIC RECORDING AND EVALUATION OF ACUTE RADIATION MORBIDITY

Background: Relatively uniform documentation systems are used for reco rding of acute side effects in oncology. Object of this work is to ill ustrate the applicability of electronic data bases for registration an d evaluation of acute side effects in radiation therapy. Methods: Base d on topographic documentation sheets, an electronic data base was dev eloped for each major topographic site. Besides general patient relate d parameters (TNM, previous chemotherapy, surgical interventions, inte rcurrent diseases and more), the kind and the degree of acute radiatio n related side effects are documented for each week of radiation and f or day 90 (RTOG) as the joint day between acute and subacute tissue re actions. Results: The temporal expenditure for the recording of the ge neral patient related parameters of a patient is less than a minute. T he weekly documentation can be performed during the daily routine work and needs approximately 5 minutes per week. The structure of the data base enables for later analyses of acute radiation related morbidity. Conclusions: Electronic data bases enable a fast and systematic recor ding and evaluation of acute radiation related side effects. The devel opment of particular registration entities for recording of acute side effects may be a possible application and demonstrates the needs of p rofessional developments.