This publication presents the proceedings of an international symposium on standards, applications and quality assurance in medical radiation dosimetry. It includes a selection of peer reviewed papers that were presented at the symposium. The symposium provided a forum for physicists and scientists of medical institutions, research centres and standards laboratories to discuss advances in radiation dosimetry made during the past decade and to exchange scientific knowledge. The topical sessions included all specialties in radiation medicine (radiation oncology, nuclear medicine and diagnostic radiology) and radiation protection dosimetry, with a specific focus on those areas where the standardization of dosimetry has improved in recent years (brachytherapy, diagnostic radiology and nuclear medicine). One session was exclusively devoted to the challenging issues of dosimetry in small and non-standard radiotherapy beams. The publication summarizes the present status and outlines future trends in medical radiation dosimetry, and also identifies possible areas for improvement.