[The first century of radiotherapy in France]

The first X-ray treatment ever given to a patient was done by Victor Despeignes of Lyon, five months after Roentgen's discovery. The first brachytherapies with radium emanation (radon) were performed a few years after the discovery (March 1st, 1896) of natural radioactivity by Becquerel and that of radium by the Curies (December 28, 1898). Marie Curie organised the Radium Institute and personally calibrated more than five thousand sources of radium disseminated in various French cancer departments. Bergonie and Tribondeau discovered (1906) the basic laws of tissular radiosensitivity. Since the work of Regaud and Coutard, published in 1925, fractionation has become the widely accepted mode of external radiation therapy. Mallet discovered the Cerenkov effect in 1926 and the Joliot-Curies artificial radioactivity in 1934. After the golden age of 200 kV X-rays and radium applications, the megavoltage era with imported telecobaltherapy units and betatrons began in 1954. Then the first french linear accelerator was manufactured. Recently the national manufacturer of linear accelerators (CGR-MeV) became a branch of General Electric Medical Systems. The French Atomic Energy Commission produces radioactive cobalt, cesium and iridium sources. In France, one century after the discovery of X rays, 326 megavoltage units are operating in 185 cancer centers, 18 university hospital radiotherapy departments, 20 comprehensive cancer centers including the Curie and the Gustave Roussy Institutes, 51 general public hospitals and 96 private clinics for a population of 58 millions inhabitants.