Utilizing clinical pathways and web-based conferences to improve quality of care in a large integrated network using breast cancer radiation therapy as the model.

BACKGROUND: Clinical pathways outline criteria for dose homogeneity and critical organ dosimetry. Based upon an internal audit showing suboptimal compliance with dosimetric parameters in whole breast irradiation (WBI), we conducted a mandatory web-based teaching conference for the network. This study reports the impact of this initiative on subsequent treatment plans.

METHODS: Radiation treatment plans were collected for the 10 most recent patients receiving WBI at 16 institutions within the UPMC Hillman Cancer Center network. Subsequently, a web-based conference was conducted to educate staff physicians, physicists, and dosimetrists with goals for dose homogeneity and critical organ dosimetry. Six months post-conference, another 10 plans were collected from each site and compared to pre-conference plans for deviations from dosimetric criteria.

RESULTS: Dose homogeneity significantly improved after the conference with breast V105% decreasing from 15.6% to 11.2% (p = 0.004) and breast V110% decreasing from 1.3% to 0.04% (p = 0.008). A higher percentage of cases were compliant with dosimetric criteria, with breast V105%  > 20% decreasing from 22.5% to 7.5% of cases (p = 0.0002) and breast V110%  > 0% decreasing from 13.8% to 4.4% of cases (p = 0.003).

CONCLUSIONS: Implementation of a web-based teaching conference helped improve adherence to clinical pathway dosimetric guidelines for WBI. In radiation oncology networks, this may be an effective model to ensure quality in routine practice and can be extrapolated to other disease sites.