[History of Hungarian radiotherapy - from radium needles to the CyberKnife]

Following the groundbreaking discoveries of X-rays, radium, and radioactivity, Hungarian radiotherapy has a 130-year history. Initially, external beam irradiation was performed by radiologists, while radium therapy was performed by representatives of manual surgical professions. Oncoradiology, and later radiotherapy, became an independent medical discipline in 1970. In this summary, we review the history of Hungarian radiotherapy, whose continuous development was significantly slowed down by the two world wars, but the dedicated experts in the field of radiation oncology (including physicians and physicists) ensured that today Hungarian cancer patients have access to the most modern radiotherapy procedures without waiting lists. Of course, within the framework of the National Cancer Control Programme significant funding will be required in the coming period to maintain and develop human resources and radiotherapy equipment.