Out of the frying pan into the fire?

During the last 10 years or so, many departments of therapeutic radiology have lost their medical and fiscal independence by administrative incorporation into "departments of oncology." The author feels that the aims of oncology centers, viz., consolidation of cancer-related activities, promotion of the image of a functioning cancer center, and the multidiscipline care of cancer patients, do not justify the radiotherapist's loss of identity within such a complex.