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Marta Cremonesi, Cecilia Arrichiello, Carla Bianchi,. Francesca Botta, Giorgia Califano ... Daniela D'Alessio, Laura D'Ambrosio, Marco D'Andrea,. Daniela Falco ...
TJ

ISSN 0300-8916

Tumori 2015; 00(00): 000-000 DOI: 10.5301/tj.5000381

Letter in Reply

Author reply to: Dear Editor, We thank the authors of the Letter to the Editor (1) for giving us the opportunity to clarify some issues regarding our review (2). As clearly shown in the Letter, we made an editing error that may mislead the reader. The indication that the “Italian Workgroup for Radiobiology” is a task group of the “Associazione Italiana di Fisica Medica (AIFM)” is indeed missing, which can cause bias (1). The paper reflects the point of view of the above task group of physicists, with a view to contributing to the scientific discussion and with no intention of establishing a milestone. The paper reported the results of a survey and is not a systematic review with meta-analysis. Using the search (((((radiobiology) OR (radiation biology))) AND (�1992/01/01� [Date - Publication] : �2012/12/31� [Date - Publication]))) AND Italy [Affiliation] with the filter “Humans” activated, 190 papers were screened. A good search should combine truncated words/phrases and possible MeSH terms, integrated with manual searching of reference lists and expert suggestions to find as many relevant articles as possible (3). Line 5 of “input data” should be “2014”, not “2012”. The 2012 limit was due to a publication delay in manuscript acceptance and publication dates. Inevitably, the results reflected the authors’ backgrounds, thus adding scientific value to the review. The papers cited in (1), being oriented towards “biologybased translational research in radiotherapy”, were beyond the scope of the review. Regarding the relevance of the subfield of modeling in radiobiology, although we agree that tumor control and normal tissue complication probability models should be used with great caution, the authors of the Letter surprisingly seem to overlook that models are routinely adopted to make decisions on therapeutic strategies for patients undergoing radiotherapy (4). We believe these models need to be improved with the continuous and experienced cooperation of radiation oncologists and medical physicists. Moreover, these models inspired dose-effect studies for radionuclide therapy (5). We would like to remind the readers of the fact that the purpose of the review was to highlight examples of multidisciplinary team synergy (such as the cited 32 institutes) and not to identify a group of physicists as a cornerstone of radiobiology.

© 2015 INTM, Italy. Published by Wichtig Publishing

As stated, “The final goal is to facilitate and build up interactive communication between different oncology specialists in order to favor an interprofessional approach to cancer, supported by international and national radiation oncology societies.” As medical physicists, we are grateful and proud to be involved in the clinical and research activities. We thank AIRB and AIRO for having started a cooperative discussion and having given us the opportunity to clarify our position of mutual collaboration and respect, so as to ensure direct benefits to radiotherapy patients. Lidia Strigari, Rocchina Caivano, Michele Avanzo, Marta Cremonesi, Cecilia Arrichiello, Carla Bianchi, Francesca Botta, Giorgia Califano, Nunzia Ciscognetti, Daniela D’Alessio, Laura D’Ambrosio, Marco D’Andrea, Daniela Falco, Francesco Guerriero, Maria Guerrisi, Domenico Mola, Maria Cristina Pressello, Anna Sarnelli, Luigi Spiazzi, Angela Terlizzi, Marcello Benassi, Piernicola Pedicini [AU: Please provide affliation of all author.] Corresponding author: [AU: please provide corresponding author.]

References 1.

2. 3. 4. 5.

Corvò R, Santoni R, Magrini SM, Maurizi Enrici R. Letter to the editor: radiobiology as a basic and clinical medical science: what the physicists have forgotten. Tumori Journal. 2015 (current issue). Strigari L, Caivano R, Avanzo M, et al. Twenty years of radiobiology in clinical practice: the Italian contribution. Tumori. 2014;100(6):625-635. McGowan J, Sampson M. Systematic reviews need systematic searchers. J Med Libr Assoc. 2005;93(1):74-80. Marks LB, Yorke ED, Jackson A, et al. Use of normal tissue complication probability models in the clinic. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys. 2010;76(3 Suppl):S10-S19. Strigari L, Konijnenberg M, Chiesa C, et al. The evidence base for the use of internal dosimetry in the clinical practice of molecular radiotherapy. Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging. 2014; 41(10):1976-1988.

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