Glossary
Medical Dosimetrist Terms & Vocabulary
15 essential medical dosimetrist terms with plain-English definitions: the vocabulary you’ll hear in training and on day one.
Key medical dosimetrist vocabulary
These 15 terms come up constantly in medical dosimetrist training, on the job and in interviews. Knowing them helps you follow instructions, document accurately and sound prepared.
- Brachytherapy
- Internal radiation.
- CMD
- Certified Medical Dosimetrist.
- Contouring
- Outlining structures on images.
- Dose-volume histogram
- Graph of dose to structures.
- Fusion
- Combining images.
- Hotspot
- Area of excess dose.
- IMRT
- Intensity-modulated radiation therapy.
- Isodose line
- Line of equal dose.
- Monitor units
- Machine output units.
- Organs at risk
- Healthy structures to protect.
- Physicist
- Checks plans and machines.
- Plan optimization
- Improving dose distribution.
- Prescription
- Ordered dose.
- Target volume
- The area to treat.
- VMAT
- Volumetric modulated arc therapy.
Practice these terms
Test yourself with the free Medical Dosimetrist practice test: it includes vocabulary questions built from this list. For a complete course, see Medical Dosimetrist training.
Browse terms from every career in our career glossary.