In the 1960s a firm rationale was developed for using raised
temperatures to treat malignant disease and there has been a continuous
expansion of the field ever since. However, a major limitation exists in
our ability to heat human tumours, especially those sited deep in the
body, with a reasonable degree of temperature uniformity. This problem
has resulted in engineers and physicists collaborating closely with
biologists and clinicians towards the common goal of developing and
testing the clinical potential of this exciting treatment modality. The
aim of the physicist and engineer is to develop acceptible methods of
heating tumQur masses in as many sites as possible to therapeutic
temperatures avoiding excessive heating of normal structures and, at the
same time, obtaining the temperature distribution throughout the heated
volume. The problem is magnified by both the theoretical and technical
limitations of heating methods and devices. Moreover, the modelling of
external deposition of energy in tissue and knowledge of tissue
perfusion are ill-defined. To this must be added the conceptual
difficulty of defining a thermal dose. The NATO course was designed to
provide a basis for the integration of physics and technology relevant
to the development of hyperthermia. There were 48 lectures covering the
theoretical and practical aspects of system design and assessment,
including, as far as possible, all the techniques of current interest
and importance in the field.