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Kataria et al. J Cancer Metastasis Treat 2017;3:21-2 Journal of
DOI: 10.20517/2394-4722.2016.73
Cancer Metastasis and Treatment

www.jcmtjournal.com
Letter to Editor Open Access

Use of a dedicated day care unit in a

modern radiation oncology facility -- a

short audit

Tejinder Kataria, Susovan Banerjee, Nimesh Dahima, Deepak Gupta, Trinanjan Basu, Shikha Goyal

Department of Radiation Oncology, Medanta-The Medicity, Gurgaon 122001, Haryana, India.

Correspondence to: Dr. Susovan Banerjee, Department of Radiation Oncology, Medanta-The Medicity, Sector 38, Gurgaon 122001, Haryana,
India. E-mail: drsusovan@gmail.com
How to cite this article: Kataria T, Banerjee S, Dahima N, Gupta D, Basu T, Goyal S. Use of a dedicated day care unit in a modern radiation
oncology facility -- a short audit. J Cancer Metastasis Treat 2017;3:21-2.
Article history: Received: 29-12-2016 Accepted: 12-01-2017 Published: 23-01-2017

Our radiotherapy department specializes in all care stay was six hours out of the 504 encounters,
types of conformal therapy including stereotactic 3 resulted in patients being shifted to the inpatient
body radiotherapy, stereotactic radiosurgery and department for further care.
brachytherapy including interstitial and prostate seed
implant. The department also includes a dedicated This is the first time in medical literature that the use
four-bed day care unit attached to the integrated and utility of a radiation oncology day care unit has
brachytherapy suite. It is managed by a resident doctor, been recorded and presented. Most of the insurance
along with four staff nurses under the supervision of a companies require patient admission for initiation of
radiation oncologist. We performed an audit of our day medical coverage, [1,2] therefore many of our patients
care unit to gain insight into its utilization and needs. used the day care facility to satisfy this insurance
requirement and also save money and time. The added
We decided to consider each encounter (admission
to the unit) as one event. We collected data from one advantage of the day care unit for the patient is that the
year, from April 2014 to March 2015. The relevant patient becomes acquainted with the department and
information was collected and tabulated using the most of the departmental staff on the first day, making
hospital’s electronic recording system. We then the remainder of treatment more comfortable.
performed an analysis of the frequency of various
events within the unit. Results were summarized in In the department besides these four beds, we also
one composite bar diagram. have four other beds where admissions were not
recorded. They are meant for use by our patients
A total of 504 events occurred in the day care during initiation and continuation of treatment for the
unit during the one-year period. The results are same purposes as the four beds we have described
summarised in Figure 1. The mean length of day above.

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