ESTRO 2024 - Abstract Book

S5929

RTT - Service evaluation, quality assurance and risk management

ESTRO 2024

Perceptions around paediatric SGRT use were generally positive, with all participants either agreeing (8/12), or strongly agreeing (4/12) that they would recommend SGRT for paediatric treatments to other RTTs. Most participants reported they found using SGRT with paediatric patients ‘very beneficial’ (9/12) but also indicated paediatric SGRT has further scope for improvement (11/12). Several participants (6/12) indicated that SGRT may reduce parent anxiety.

Focus group data

Five themes were identified: Patient experience, impact of SGRT on parent anxiety, impact of SGRT on General Anaesthetic (GA) use, user experience and patient safety.

Theme 1. Patient experience

The ability of SGRT to allow treatments to be tattoo and mark-free was highlighted as an improvement to patient experience, along with reduced overall treatment duration due to improved setup efficiency. SGRT allows for open faced masks that can be “a big factor in helping reduce [children’s] anxiety”. It was also noted that in older paediatric patients, describing the function of active monitoring can help relieve anxiety and “was quite reassuring”. The need for patients to be uncovered during setup and intrafraction monitoring was described as a negative impact on patient experience.

Theme 2. Impact of SGRT on parent anxiety

Participants described the impact of SGRT on parent anxiety positively. This was particularly through providing a reassurance of treatment accuracy.

Theme 3. Impact of SGRT on GA use

Participants noted that SGRT could help reduce the need for GA in borderline patients through the addition of safety from active monitoring during treatment. However, it was felt that in general SGRT alone was not reason enough for eliminating GA, but would assist when used in conjunction with other techniques such as music therapy and distraction therapy.

Theme 4. User Experience

Participants noted that treatment efficiency can be improved with SGRT by improving setup accuracy. The function of active monitoring was also noted as being particularly reassuring for the RTTs. While the impact on user experience was largely positive, a challenge surrounding a paediatric SGRT-specific learning curve was identified.