Preventative Maintenance Helps Ward Off Unplanned LINAC Repairs

LINAC’s is short for linear accelerator, which are used in radiation treatments for people with cancer.  These machines should receive preventative maintenance so that they stay in working order for as long as possible.  Any preventative maintenance that isn’t completed within a timely manner can create issues and cause unplanned equipment failure.  Those LINAC repair services can cause long downtimes, which can wreak havoc on every patient’s treatment plan.

Preventative maintenance will not only keep LINAC machines in working order, it will also ensure that the machines are delivering proper treatments that are appropriate for each patient.  Part of the preventative maintenance is performing safety checks, which may not always cause an unplanned LINAC repair, but they may cause additional preventative maintenance to be completed to recalibrate certain settings.

Certain forms of preventative maintenance are completed every day, while others may be completed weekly, monthly, or annually.  Of course, whenever a person believes that the LINAC system is performing differently, or something seems wrong, preventative maintenance should be done to find the cause of the issue.  Sometimes, a tweak here or there can save thousands of dollars in the future when it comes to expensive LINAC repair services.

During preventative maintenance, certain linear accelerator parts may be replaced around the time that they were known to wear out on other machines.  By being proactive with these replacements, LINAC users will ensure that their machine will be in service when they are needed instead of being down for maintenance.  It normally costs less to perform this type of linear accelerator repair before it is needed, because it can be scheduled in advance.  That means that less money will be spent paying for the labor of the person doing the work.

However, if preventative maintenance is not completed, and a person does not know that a specific part should be replaced sooner than later, the cost could be quite a bit more when the machine stops working.  The reason for that is because a person would need to be called in immediately, which can cost more after hours or on weekends.  Plus, it can take longer to do the work, since other things could be wrong at the same time, which means that the LINAC machine can be out of order for a couple of days or longer.

Cancer patients rely on LINAC machines to safely deliver their treatments, so that they have an excellent chance of surviving.  Downtime for these situations are unacceptable and unnecessary, especially when most issues can be spotted and resolved during scheduled preventative maintenance.

Acceletronics is an independent service company dedicated to delivering the best equipment performance and service reliability from Linear Accelerators and CT Scanners across all major brands and models. Learn more about Acceletronics and their selection of new and refurbished linear accelerators and CT scanners today at http://www.acceletronics.com.  To contact one of our LINAC experts call 610.524.3300.

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