Radiotherapy Physics – 2025 review results

Current priority areas

• 10 Year Health Plan for England: fit for the future
• Science in healthcare: Delivering the NHS Long Term Plan – The Chief Scientific Officer’s strategy

Stakeholder feedback

Feedback collecting through the Curriculum Library survey collected between January 2024 and November 2025. All stakeholder feedback is presented verbatim.

Programme

• I have found it challenging to participate in routine clinical work—such as radiotherapy planning and quality assurance—particularly during the final year of my STP. Although I completed all required training activities, I needed to re-learn radiotherapy planning and quality control tests after spending considerable time on training tasks, my MSc project, and preparing for final assessments and interviews. To support a smoother transition from STP to a Band 7 Radiotherapy Physicist role, the curriculum should place greater emphasis on involving trainees in routine clinical work. I recommend reducing the number of training activities within the specialism to allow more time for hands-on clinical experience.
• The wrong approach has been taken with STP training activities. There is an attempt to cover all aspects of radiotherapy – too much breadth. There is not enough depth. It would be better for the trainees to concentrate on gaining a deep understanding of basic radiotherapy techniques, rather than a superficial understanding of everything. There is plenty of time later in their career to develop skills in more specialist areas.
• In general, I feel there are too many competencies, especially DOPS and OCE and CBD, which overlap a lot with the training activities and just involve duplicate paperwork. The CBD form is too generic and my training officers never know how to fill it in.
• The focus in STP training doesnt seem to align particularly well with being signed off to work autonomously in the training centre. the focus is on a lot of theory but it means that when STPs become registered clinical scientists they may not actually have done any practical aspects on their own. training centres vary but we have employed registered clinical scientists from elsewhere who never did QA on their own. i feel the focus of the training should be to produce registered clinical scientists who are able to work safely and autonomously
• As the NHS is aiming to be net zero by 2040 and climate change and its associated extreme weather will increasingly effect our patients, we have a duty to teach trainees (and all staff) about environmental sustainability. The best way to do this is to include it within the curricula and as a competency. I urge you to include this now as with every passing year this is only going to get more urgent.
• I really appreciate how the curriculum enables trainees to engage with newer developments in radiotherapy physics, and the reflective element has enabled me to set achievable targets for professional development. However, there is only one specialism training activity related to computing (S-RP-S3-14: Perform a clinical software upgrade) and I think there should be more content focused on developing trainee understanding of legislation related to clinical software, especially as new software is being persistently introduced to radiotherapy departments with the ongoing drive for automation. I also feel that some content is a bit ‘misplaced’ – e.g. S-RP-S1-09 (review local rules) and S-RP-S3-10 (perform manual calculations). While I appreciate the importance of such tasks, I do not feel that they accurately represent what radiotherapy physicists regularly do for their jobs in most departments.
• I find that the emphasis on STP is on reflection not on actual learning outcomes. There is also a lack of emphasis on core knowledge, for example I need to know that a trainee can safely identify what to do with an output out of tolerance. There are certain key bits of essential knowledge that a trainee needs to have. I don’t necessarily need the trainee to have commissioned anything, or to have done a bunker survey, these can all be in suggested tasks for the trainee and it can be submit X number of pieces evidence to demonstrate your understanding of some of the following tasks. This would free up the trainee to focus in more on fundamentals, and to integrate more into the working of the department. I’d like to see the volume of trainee work decrease but the depth and quality of work increase. There is also no clear mechanism where when a trainee is failing to meet academic standards I can easily fail them. I can give feedback, I can get them to edit their work and send it to me for evaluation again. But there is no mechanism by which I can say this trainee has needed to rewrite this piece of work 6 times now, so it is no longer their work it is mine. It sort of sets the trainee up for a very difficult career.
• Please consider highlighting the impact of climate change on patients
• Environmental sustainability is an area that will become increasingly important to consider, as carbon reduction is embedded in the NHS via the Health & Care Act 2022. It is also important that sustainability measures are impactful and align with best clinical practice and financial performance. It is common to find that staff are concerned about this, but unaware of how to embed sustainability within their practice. There is a need for clinical scientists to become more aware of this issue, and of how to address it within the hospital setting. Within clinical science, I think the best way to achieve this would be to formalise some form of sustainability teaching within the STP curriculum, as a “professional standard” or elsewhere.
• The removal of the radiotherapy computing module I think was a real backwards step.
• Radiotherapy physics as a job is now heavily focussed on implementing and using an incredibly wide array of digital systems and the physicist effectively acting as an executive based on what a piece of software is showing them. Without the basic grounding the networking and concepts such as DICOM new scientists will find it much harder to work with these systems and debug them.
• The inclusion of a clinical computing rotation in the Clinical Engineering STP was good, but it is a first year rotation, and with the shortening of those it is not considered to be that serious, compared to the inclusion of a module in the speciality rotations for radiotherapy physics.
• I understand if the Clinical Computing STP was growing rapidly enough to fill the gap left by the removal of the module from radiotherapy physics, but as I understand that isn’t the case at this point.

S-RP-R1 Introduction to Radiotherapy Physics

Training activities

• 2 – We don’t actually have an MDT to review treatment plans! We end up lumping this together with 1 (attending an MDT where potential new patients are being discussed)

Direct Observation of Practical Skills (DOPS)

• there currently is no DOPS- As DOPS have to be performed under direct supervision there is scope to have a DOPS in radiotherapy. It also could be a DOPS that clearly won’t directly impact patients such as the creation of a training plan

S-RP-S1 External Beam Radiotherapy Techniques

Module aim

• There is a real lack of any kind of computing aspect of radiotherapy in the curriculum. As computing becomes a larger part of radiotherapy, it seems unintuitive that many of the computing/IT training activities have been removed. I would like to see this reinstated to help prepare future trainees better in the future.

Training activities

• 5 – The scope of this training activity (TA) is too wide and ambiguous. Firstly, the TA gives the task of auditing the overall quality assurance (QA) programme for a treatment unit. I therefore undertook an audit of the QA programme against IPEM report 81. This in itself is a large, time-consuming task. There are over 60 tests recommended by IPEM 81 and the audit required justification of our centres QA programme against all of these and recommendations where necessary. Secondly, the TA also assigned the task of assessing whether the quality management system (QMS) meets the requirements. This can be interpreted in multiple ways. This could require a full ISO 9001:2015 audit of the QMS which would also be a lengthy, time consuming task. Even assessing the QMS in relation to machine QA tasks is a lengthy process. Therefore, the scope of this TA is too wide and ambiguous. The TA task should be clarified and split into two TAs.
• 12 – Not obvious what is meant by “Assess the clinical relevance of the CT and CBCT scanning protocols available for one anatomical site”

S-RP-S2 Brachytherapy and other Specialised Radiotherapy Techniques

Training activities

• 1 – Not all centres do HDR. Why can’t this training activity just be “Perform post source change quality assurance”
• 3 – Not all centres do HDR and not all do gynae. Why not just have a generic “produce and evaluate treatment plans” for a range of sites.
• 4 – Many centres only carry out gynaecological brachytherapy therefore this training activity cannot be completed without arranging to do a placement in another centre. This is quite difficult to organise. All west midlands centres are only delivering gynae brachy therefore the trainee would have to travel a significant distance to complete this, if it can even be organised.
• 4 – There are no planned treatments of non-gynae sites in the NTC. It has also been noted that trainees outside of the NTC are also struggling to meet this one. I think there may have been some training sessions during the MSc block to address this however is worth  there has been a struggle to meet this
• 10 – “Advise on kV treatments for patients covering a range of anatomical sites including suitable treatment delivery parameters ” is not actually something done  by Physicists at our centre. We send trainees to the skin clinic to talk to clinicians about why they have chosen the modality, energy and shielding that they have, and get them to do practice calculations of monitor units, but we would not be expecting an STP trainee to actually provide advice.
• 11 – “Advise on electron treatments for patients covering a range of anatomical sites including suitable treatment delivery parameters ” is not actually something done  by Physicists at our centre. We send trainees to the skin clinic to talk to clinicians about why they have chosen the modality, energy and shielding that they have, and get them to do practice calculations of monitor units, but we would not be expecting an STP trainee to actually provide advice.

S-RP-S3 Advanced Radiotherapy Techniques

• no feedback received

Changes made

Module level changes

Major changes

Programme level changes

• no changes made
  

Periodic review

This specialty curriculum requires significant change beyond the scope of an annual review.

Response – no

Rationale

Please provide an overview of the rationale for why the proposed changes are needed or why changes were not needed, with reference to stakeholder feedback.

Response

Programme 

I have found it challenging to participate in routine clinical work—such as radiotherapy planning and quality assurance—particularly during the final year of my STP. Although I completed all required training activities, I needed to re-learn radiotherapy planning and quality control tests after spending considerable time on training tasks, my MSc project, and preparing for final assessments and interviews. To support a smoother transition from STP to a Band 7 Radiotherapy Physicist role, the curriculum should place greater emphasis on involving trainees in routine clinical work. I recommend reducing the number of training activities within the specialism to allow more time for hands-on clinical experience.

Comment: the training activities have been designed to cover clinical activities that a registered clinical scientist are required to undertake and to give a broad overview of radiotherapy. Participating in routine clinical work should enable training activities to be covered

The wrong approach has been taken with STP training activities. There is an attempt to cover all aspects of radiotherapy – too much breadth. There is not enough depth. It would be better for the trainees to concentrate on gaining a deep understanding of basic radiotherapy techniques, rather than a superficial understanding of everything. There is plenty of time later in their career to develop skills in more specialist areas.

Comment: it is important for an STP trainee exiting the scheme to have a base knowledge of all aspects of radiotherapy to prepare them for their future career

In general, I feel there are too many competencies, especially DOPS and OCE and CBD, which overlap a lot with the training activities and just involve duplicate paperwork. The CBD form is too generic and my training officers never know how to fill it in.

Comment: Paperwork can be uploaded multiple times on OneFile if required. The CBD form is beyond the remit of this curriculum review

The focus in STP training doesnt seem to align particularly well with being signed off to work autonomously in the training centre. the focus is on a lot of theory but it means that when STPs become registered clinical scientists they may not actually have done any practical aspects on their own. training centres vary but we have employed registered clinical scientists from elsewhere who never did QA on their own. i feel the focus of the training should be to produce registered clinical scientists who are able to work safely and autonomously

Comment: STP trainees are supernumery and should be supervised at all times.  Trainees exit the scheme as minimally competent clinical scientists and therefore there is no requirement for them be work autonomously.  In order to meet training activities, they may achieve local competency sign off but this is not a requirement of the scheme.

As the NHS is aiming to be net zero by 2040 and climate change and its associated extreme weather will increasingly effect our patients, we have a duty to teach trainees (and all staff) about environmental sustainability. The best way to do this is to include it within the curricula and as a competency. I urge you to include this now as with every passing year this is only going to get more urgent.

Environmental Sustainability training activity to be added

I really appreciate how the curriculum enables trainees to engage with newer developments in radiotherapy physics, and the reflective element has enabled me to set achievable targets for professional development. However, there is only one specialism training activity related to computing (S-RP-S3-14: Perform a clinical software upgrade) and I think there should be more content focused on developing trainee understanding of legislation related to clinical software, especially as new software is being persistently introduced to radiotherapy departments with the ongoing drive for automation. I also feel that some content is a bit ‘misplaced’ – e.g. S-RP-S1-09 (review local rules) and S-RP-S3-10 (perform manual calculations). While I appreciate the importance of such tasks, I do not feel that they accurately represent what radiotherapy physicists regularly do for their jobs in most departments.

Computing / AI training activity & MSc content to be added

I find that the emphasis on STP is on reflection not on actual learning outcomes. There is also a lack of emphasis on core knowledge, for example I need to know that a trainee can safely identify what to do with an output out of tolerance. There are certain key bits of essential knowledge that a trainee needs to have. I don’t necessarily need the trainee to have commissioned anything, or to have done a bunker survey, these can all be in suggested tasks for the trainee and it can be submit X number of pieces evidence to demonstrate your understanding of some of the following tasks. This would free up the trainee to focus in more on fundamentals, and to integrate more into the working of the department. I’d like to see the volume of trainee work decrease but the depth and quality of work increase. There is also no clear mechanism where when a trainee is failing to meet academic standards I can easily fail them. I can give feedback, I can get them to edit their work and send it to me for evaluation again. But there is no mechanism by which I can say this trainee has needed to rewrite this piece of work 6 times now, so it is no longer their work it is mine. It sort of sets the trainee up for a very difficult career.

Comment: Agree with your comments; the design of the scheme is set for all HCS specialisms though.  Being able to choose from a pool of training activities would make assessment difficult as every trainee would have completed a different selection.

Please consider highlighting the impact of climate change on patients

Environmental Sustainability training activity to be added

Environmental sustainability is an area that will become increasingly important to consider, as carbon reduction is embedded in the NHS via the Health & Care Act 2022. It is also important that sustainability measures are impactful and align with best clinical practice and financial performance. It is common to find that staff are concerned about this, but unaware of how to embed sustainability within their practice. There is a need for clinical scientists to become more aware of this issue, and of how to address it within the hospital setting. Within clinical science, I think the best way to achieve this would be to formalise some form of sustainability teaching within the STP curriculum, as a “professional standard” or elsewhere.

Environmental Sustainability training activity to be added

The removal of the radiotherapy computing module I think was a real backwards step.

Computing / AI training activity & MSc content to be added

Radiotherapy physics as a job is now heavily focussed on implementing and using an incredibly wide array of digital systems and the physicist effectively acting as an executive based on what a piece of software is showing them. Without the basic grounding the networking and concepts such as DICOM new scientists will find it much harder to work with these systems and debug them.

Computing / AI training activity & MSc content to be added

The inclusion of a clinical computing rotation in the Clinical Engineering STP was good, but it is a first year rotation, and with the shortening of those it is not considered to be that serious, compared to the inclusion of a module in the speciality rotations for radiotherapy physics.

Computing / AI training activity & MSc content to be added

I understand if the Clinical Computing STP was growing rapidly enough to fill the gap left by the removal of the module from radiotherapy physics, but as I understand that isn’t the case at this point.

Computing / AI training activity & MSc content to be added

S-RP-R1 Introduction to Radiotherapy Physics

Training Activities

2 – We don’t actually have an MDT to review treatment plans! We end up lumping this together with 1 (attending an MDT where potential new patients are being discussed)

Comment: this is an appropriate way of meeting this training activity

Direct Observation of Practical Skills (DOPS) – there currently is no DOPS- As DOPS have to be performed under direct supervision there is scope to have a DOPS in radiotherapy. It also could be a DOPS that clearly won’t directly impact patients such as the creation of a training plan

Comment: requirement of RP-R1 is to complete 1 CBD and either 1 OCE or DOP

S-RP-S1 External Beam Radiotherapy Techniques

Module Aim

There is a real lack of any kind of computing aspect of radiotherapy in the curriculum. As computing becomes a larger part of radiotherapy, it seems unintuitive that many of the computing/IT training activities have been removed. I would like to see this reinstated to help prepare future trainees better in the future.

Computing / AI training activity & MSc content to be added

Training Activities

5 – The scope of this training activity (TA) is too wide and ambiguous. Firstly, the TA gives the task of auditing the overall quality assurance (QA) programme for a treatment unit. I therefore undertook an audit of the QA programme against IPEM report 81. This in itself is a large, time-consuming task. There are over 60 tests recommended by IPEM 81 and the audit required justification of our centres QA programme against all of these and recommendations where necessary. Secondly, the TA also assigned the task of assessing whether the quality management system (QMS) meets the requirements. This can be interpreted in multiple ways. This could require a full ISO 9001:2015 audit of the QMS which would also be a lengthy, time consuming task. Even assessing the QMS in relation to machine QA tasks is a lengthy process. Therefore, the scope of this TA is too wide and ambiguous. The TA task should be clarified and split into two TAs.

Comment: it is important for trainees to be familiar with performing audits in radiotherapy

12 – Not obvious what is meant by “Assess the clinical relevance of the CT and CBCT scanning protocols available for one anatomical site”

Comment: please see ‘Considerations’ section of the training activity

S-RP-S2 Brachytherapy and other Specialised Radiotherapy Techniques

Training Activities

1 – Not all centres do HDR. Why can’t this training activity just be “Perform post source change quality assurance”

Change TA: Perform HDR or PDR post source change quality assurance MINOR CHANGE

3 – Not all centres do HDR and not all do gynae. Why not just have a generic “produce and evaluate treatment plans” for a range of sites.

Change TA: Produce and evaluate an HDR brachytherapy gynaecological plan for patient treatment

Comment: the majority of brachytherapy centres perform gynaecological treatments as a minimum; it is important that trainees have experience of gynaecological brachytherapy treatments.

4 – Many centres only carry out gynaecological brachytherapy therefore this training activity cannot be completed without arranging to do a placement in another centre. This is quite difficult to organise. All west midlands centres are only delivering gynae brachy therefore the trainee would have to travel a significant distance to complete this, if it can even be organised.

Comment: we were aware of this when we wrote the curriculum but felt it important the trainees have experience of an additional site.  We deliberately kept the TA vague to allow a wide range of sites to be included. We will review this TA again at the next curriculum review

4 – There are no planned treatments of non-gynae sites in the NTC. It has also been noted that trainees outside of the NTC are also struggling to meet this one. I think there may have been some training sessions during the MSc block to address this however is worth  there has been a struggle to meet this

Comment: we were aware of this when we wrote the curriculum but felt it important the trainees have experience of an additional site.  We deliberately kept the TA vague to allow a wide range of sites to be included. We will review this TA again at the next curriculum review

10 – “Advise on kV treatments for patients covering a range of anatomical sites including suitable treatment delivery parameters ” is not actually something done by Physicists at our centre. We send trainees to the skin clinic to talk to clinicians about why they have chosen the modality, energy and shielding that they have, and get them to do practice calculations of monitor units, but we would not be expecting an STP trainee to actually provide advice.

Comment: this is an appropriate way of meeting this training activity

11 – “Advise on electron treatments for patients covering a range of anatomical sites including suitable treatment delivery parameters ” is not actually something done  by Physicists at our centre. We send trainees to the skin clinic to talk to clinicians about why they have chosen the modality, energy and shielding that they have, and get them to do practice calculations of monitor units, but we would not be expecting an STP trainee to actually provide advice.

Comment: this is an appropriate way of meeting this training activity

I confirm I have reviewed the Reflective Practice Guidance for ETAs and DTAs and have made any changes necessary.

Specialty Lead Editor signature: Clare Anderson
Date: 22 December 2025

Change control - completed by the school

Programme structure

Completed by: Chris Fisher
Date: 12 January 2026

Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) mapping

• no change to learning outcomes, HCPC mapping maintained

Completed by: Chris Fisher
Date: 12 January 2026

Major change stakeholder survey

Feedback from stakeholders on the proposed major changes was collected through a survey between 16 January and 8 February 2026.  All stakeholder feedback is presented verbatim.

Total respondents: 52

Major change: M2, M3 and M4

Do these changes provide beneficial skills and knowledge to trainees?

• Yes: 38
• No: 9
• Can’t comment: 5
• Please tell us why you don’t think these changes will provide beneficial skills and knowledge to trainees
  • Yes for dicom/computing less so for sustainability that should be in prof practice not RT physics it is all HCS
  • The project proposal is a lot of extra work for an already busy course. Maybe environmental impact can just be considered in other training activities
  • Academic indicative is already covered in some of the professional skills and in the short rotation comeptencys. The enviromental sustainability is not a good use of time, it is not something we get involved in day to day.
  • TA suggestion 1: Although a good idea to include a TA on environmental sustainability – creating a project proposal feels forced, especially when there are limited options/changes which can be made as many common ones are already in place. There is already a reusable water bottle scheme in place, SF6 is a manufacturer issue, and audits have been done on staff travel. But if people live far away, they aren’t going to add commute times through public transport which isn’t near the hospital, regular or affordable. Cycle2work scheme is offered by the Trust already, lights are on timers. An audit on the state of environmental sustainability in the Department feels much more realistic, they can then investigate further if there is something to follow.
  • TA suggestion 2: No problem – feels like an achievable/realistic DTA
  • The ‘Academic Indicative Content’ is already covered at Liverpool University
  • Second and third – “Yes”
  • Training Activity 1 – “no”, skills of writing project proposals and finding new initiatives are already covered in other Tas
  • The environmental sustainability activity, whilst very relevant to the climate change crisis, is not the best use of a trainee’s time. Multiple studies have shown that the CO2 biggest factor is patient travel, which is is difficult to reduce except through better public transport or hypofractionation, both of which are outside the sphere of influence of a physics trainee. The software development and governance activities/content are both more relevant.
  • The department and trainees are already struggling with the workload of the curriculum. Adding new training activities will further add to the volume of work and will reduce the amount of time that the trainees can spend learning the core competencies required for the job. It will also dilute the time of the trainers, resulting in them spending less time teaching the core knowledge and competencies of a radiotherapy physicist.
  • Time is the most precious resource that the trainees and department have and it is better that the trainee can focus this time on the absolute essentials of the job rather than making the syllabus too broad.
  • First change is not a radiotherapy specific requirement. If it is needed, it is needed as a generic training activity for all specialisms.
  • The last two changes relate to Clinical Scientific Computing. This is a separate specialism that will have very limited applicability to most radiotherapy physicists.
  • The environmental sustainability project would not help me at all to learn to become a radiotherapy physicist and will add extra overhead to what are already too many training activities.
  • The two activities around software are very specific aspects of the job not really encountered during the STP.

Do these changes address a need in your workplace?

• Yes: 28
• No: 8
• Can’t comment: 16
• Please tell us why you don’t think these changes will address a need in your workplace
  • These are quite specific and are not something I would often see a registered clinical scientist participating in. They almost seem more tailored for the core modules rather than radiotherapy specific and could potentially be difficult to complete in the workspace. But I do think these could address some important topics like sustainability for the core objectives.
  • computer governanance managed largely by other departments here.
  • Environmental sustainability is not something that we currently look at in my department. it might be difficult to support or even think about a project to propose to a trainee.
  • With regards to the computing/software/AI content it would be useful to have in an academic setting. Practically in the workplace not all workplaces develop software and it would be more useful to have a how to safely implement AI clinically section rather than a generic introduction to AI.
  • Again specifically for version control, unless you are developing your own software this is not applicable and could be incorporated within the basic software development best practices.
  • The audit training activity would be useful to the trainees and the workplace.
  • See above
  • Environmental sustainability – whilst moving towards greater sustainability is a positive goal, it feels like it is beyond the scope of what it is essential for the trainee to focus on. It would not be expected that a trainee would be the driving force towards these changes and the department does not currently have the resources to be looking into this.
  • Software development – software development is not something that every department does and, whilst a useful skill, is not something that is essential for the job. I would therefore consider this training activity to be beyond the requirements of the syllabus. The department already has a QS set up for software development which is reviewed regularly, this would not be considered a trainee role to do this review.
  • Will be very dependent on software development happening locally.
  • Sustainability will likely be a paper exercise of little to no value to the individual or the department.
  • We already have a sustainability network in our centre, to which all the obvious suggestions have been made.
  • The implementation of AI in the NHS so far (CoPilot) is woeful and should not be the funnel into which trainees learn about AI. There are much more capable models that can be discovered and played with outside the STP such as CLI models, local models, Claude/Gemini/OpenAI/Ollama/Qwen.
  • The important aspects of this are already being done but adding these as requirements for trainees also adds work for trainers and assessors

Would your workplace be able to deliver the programme with these proposed changes?

• Yes: 28
• No: 4
• Can’t comment: 14
• Please tell us why you don’t think your workplace would be able to deliver the programme with these proposed changes
  • If adding these means they spend less time on other things as we are asking more on an already packed programme against the original spirit of the make every specialism have the same number and goals. Other specialism have activities far less complex and detailed than RT Physics already. Why not the same expectations. We can deliver the content but s it fair
  • Time constraints due to addition of two more competencies without the removal or reduction in workload elsewhere. Trainees who have completed the new curriculum so far have only just completed all required work before the deadline.
  • If you dont develop software locally you can’t audit local processes.
  • We are already stretched as it is, you are adding in more work to cover on an already full programme

Would you feel safe if someone who completed the programme, including these changes, was involved in delivering health care for you, within their scope of practice?

• Yes: 43
• No: 2
• Can’t comment:  7
• Please tell us why you wouldn’t feel safe with someone who completed the programme, including this change, was involved within their scope of practice, in delivering health care for you
  • If adding these means they spend less time on other things as we are asking more on an already packed programme against the original spirit of the make every specialism have the same number and goals. Other specialism have activities far less complex and detailed than RT Physics already. Why not the same expectations
  • The syllabus is already extensive and, relative to pre-STP, the training programme has been reduced from 4 years to 3 years. Training activities are very specific and many of them address areas that are beyond the scope of what I would expect from an STP trainee (some are more in line with what I would expect of someone training to be an MPE or even on the HSST course).  Much of a trainees time is taken in completing training activities that are beyond what I would considered to be the core requirements of a radiotherapy trainee. This reduces the time that they have to learn both the core academic and practical aspects of the job, resulting in them requiring further training when they qualify to get them to a point where they can be signed off as competent for day to day activities. This situation was further exacerbated with the 2022 syllabus which seemed to remove a lot of the ‘lower level’ (but essential) training activities whilst adding a lot of ‘higher level’ training activities. This contrasts with pre-STP where trainees could hit the ground running from the day their state registration kicked in.

Do you have any further comments on these proposed changes?

• Yes you have not said what these are replacing or if they are additional training activities. If they are additional this is getting unreasonable as the point was all programmes were meant to have the same number of activities and this would add more activities
• Sustainability should be all disciplines and in professional practice
• Whilst I can see the benefit of adding both these training activities, the workload is already high and I think it would be sufficient to just add the topics to the University teaching.
• I agree with the second two but the first one is nonsense and far too difficult. More reasonable to ask them to include consideration of environmental sustainability as part of a project proposal but to expect that to be the focus of the change is unreasonable.
• This academic content is already covered well by the Liverpool masters programme.
• These are useful additions with the increasing consideration of environmental sustainability and the new medical device regulations that are impacting the local development of in-house software. Many of the academic content proposed was already covered on the Liverpool MSc course
• Would be good to have a more computing focused task as a training activity rather than just legislation. It is all well and good being taught about it at university, but seeing how this integrates in departments would be ideal. Most departments have the capability to script – this should form more of a focus here.
• Since the curriculum change there has potentially been a knowledge gap regarding computing which used to be covered by the old computing competencies. I think adding this in to the academic component is a good alternative but that some work-based computing activities would still be beneficial.
• Environmental sustainability is important in our role as clinical scientists and I would fully support this being incorporated into training.
• I think it is important to gauge what computing expertise is like in radiotherapy physics training providers, ensuring there is access to workshops for trainees who may struggle to complete computing-related training activities.
• I feel the environmental sustainability training activity is not radiotherapy specific and could be instead in the S-C1 module. I think the software processes audit is a very important topic for trainees to learn about so is a good addition.
• Not necessarily a bad addition but do not feel this is a good use of trainee time.
• Strongly in favour of the academic indicative content changes.
• The training activity for an environmental sustainability challenge, while noble, does not relate to Radiotherapy specifically in any way and is therefore inappropriate for a Radiotherapy specific module.
• I fully support the introduction of the computing based academic content and associated training activity but think that this module is not the right place for them. This knowledge and understanding is important for all medical physics and clinical engineering specialisms and so would be better placed in a core module that spans all of these specialisms.
• It looks like these will be additional TAs, rather than replacement ones.  The number and depth of TAs in Radiotherapy already feels quite a lot.
• I don’t feel the environmental sustainability activity adds anything for a newly qualified clinical scientist. This appears to fit better with HSST where large-scale change/leadership might be required. I can understand the motivation behind this (that the future workforce needs to have sustainability in mind) but think it’s just adding unnecessary work to a stretched trainee. If included this should be in the wider professional module as it applies to all specialisms, not just radiotherapy. I strongly support the proposals for software development and AI knowledge, this is a gap in current workforce training, and the academic modules must adapt to provide.
• Which would these replace or would these be in addition to?
• Not sure what relevance environmental sustainability has to radiotherapy physics training. Seems more like professional practice.
• These topics can be covered by already existing training activities, and I don’t think the number of activities should be increased.
• They have little to do with safe practice of staff involved in delivering radiotherapy services.
• In Training activity : Quality improvement project aligned with NHS values and best practice
• Instead of just an introduction to AI which is now in routine use , it should be reframed as basic awareness of governance and guidelines around the use of AI as a medical device.
• Some of this is quite vague and high level for someone who is only just qualified as a registered clinical scientist. For example, “audit the department’s processes against the current legislative landscape” (for software dev / implementation) – this is a huge task and particularly for a trainee. Some of this seems to cover things which I – an 8a – don’t even really cover (e.g. relational databases).
• I think creating a project proposal may not be a good use of time if it isn’t carried out.
• Confused on academic indicative content – proposed change seems unclear.
• I think the “Academic indicative content” outlined above is generally already delivered with the core program, however with more and more internal software development and management becoming routine, more formal addressing of these issues is likely valuable.
• Like many departments, our department is increasingly turning to in-house or open-source software for both clinical and non-clinical use cases. The legislation related to this is quite complex but very well structured to guide safe development and implementation, and therefore ensuring trainees have good awareness of this during the program would be beneficial. However, some smaller centres may have limited experience with these kinds of activities, and therefore may struggle to deliver these elements without outsourcing to another centre.
• Environmental sustainability is another area that is growing in popularity, and is something we are aiming to embed within our QI process, however specific sustainability projects are often lower priority than clinical QI. Allowing trainees some specific time for this work may be beneficial where other staff cannot be freed up, however it may mean there are challenges for some trainees to get the support they need from substantive staff. Again, smaller centres with less experience in this area may struggle to deliver this element of the program.
• We have a clinical scientific computing team established within the department who focus on many of the aforementioned aspects. I do think it will be beneficial to learn more about the governance and risk management of developing or implementing clinical software. I also think there should be more of an emphasis within our training on the work that goes on behind the scenes in clinical scientific computing.
• Looks amazing! I almost wished I had these in current training activity needs; These are also in trend with the current implementation on of auto-contouring/ auto-segmentation software being used clinically
• Medical physics services in NHS Wales are not satisfied with the programme specialism content combinations as these do not matching service provision. NSHCS needs to offer a Medical Physics (Selected) STP programme where the specialisms are selected by the service – the current approach is not fit for purpose.