Quality assurance in radiotherapy: analysis of the causes of not starting or early radiotherapy withdrawal

Radiation Oncology

Table 1 Patient characteristics of all incomplete treatments

		N	%
Sex	Male	89	74
	Female	32	26
Tumour location	Lung	34	28
	Rectum	19	16
	Skin	14	12
	Other	54	45
Metastasis	Yes	41	34
	No	80	66
Palliative	Yes	46	38
	No	75	62
Concomitant chemotherapy	Yes	46	38
	No	75	62
Ambulance	Yes	70	58
	No	51	42
Inpatient	Yes	33	27
	No	88	73
Type of early withdrawal	Incomplete course	58	48
	Any fraction	63	52
Reason for withdrawal	Death due to tumour progression	35	29
	Clinical progression	23	19
	Death due to non-oncology reasons	17	14
	Toxicity	12	10
	Patient refusal	10	8
	Dosimetric issues	5	4
	Other	19	16

ISSN: 1748-717X