The Global Quality Assurance of Radiation Therapy Clinical Trials Harmonization Group Recommendations for Сontouring of OARs

QUANTEC report summarized the data of the dose constrains for critical structures in radiotherapy. The authors of this report determined that one of the obstacles to obtaining meaningful data on tolerant doses was inconsistency in the nomenclature of names. And inconsistencies in the guidelines for contouring the organs at risk increase the variability in contouring. Eliminating these inconsistencies increases the speed and safety of the workflow within each individual healthcare facility and improves the accuracy and reliability of the data underlying the dose limits that are developed. The standardization of terminology facilitates the integration of dosimetry data, the creation of various templates and scripts to automate the creation of a prescription for the RT course for similar cases, and the automation of reports. It helps to train the systems supporting artificial intelligence. AAPM report TG-263 resolved the nomenclature problem, however, different anatomical boundaries of different organs were still hidden under the same names in various large research centers. In 2020 The Global Quality Assurance of Radiation Therapy Clinical Trials Harmonization Group published an article. It summarized the many years of work by the scientific radiotherapy community to standardize the approach to delineating the OARs. This article provides an overview of the article key points and provides links to outline guides. A special attention it was paid to clarifying the anatomical boundaries of such OARs: heart, femoral heads, skin, individual structures of the gastrointestinal tract and substructures of the eye.