April Moore

Professional Service Project

September 15, 2015

Considered a booming health town, Pittsburgh has two main health systems with more
than 20 hospitals. The Pittsburgh area is also lucky enough to have a variety of allied health
programs at many universities including a radiation therapy school at our local community
college.
After x-ray school I decided to pursue radiation therapy at the Community College of
Allegheny County here in Pittsburgh. It was a fantastic learning experience with several rotations
throughout the different hospitals. It wasnt until I was working in the field full time that I started
to see more of what a medical dosimetrist did and how they took part in the radiation oncology
team. My therapy training had been limited to rotations at the treatment machines, simulator and
any class work on campus. We were not given a specific rotation through dosimetry/ physics and
the clinical lectures just touched on what was needed for therapy boards. My main purpose of
this professional service project was to promote the field of medial dosimetry to the students at
the radiation therapy school so that they can gain more knowledge and insight into the field, how
it relates to what they will be doing in their future therapy careers as well as to provide
information to the steps that need to be taken if one was interested in becoming a medical
dosimetrist.
The students that I presented this lecture for were all prior x-ray technicians now part of
the radiation therapy certificate program at the community college. From their x-ray training they
already hold the basic anatomy and physiology knowledge as well as patient care understanding
as they enter the radiation therapy program. I was able to introduce myself as someone who had
followed the same path that they were on now, from x-ray tech to radiation therapist and now a
medical dosimetrist.

I compiled a power point presentation of the role of a medical dosimetrist and the the
treatment planning process. I was able to list the steps of treatment planning from patient
consultation to the treatment so that they could see how we all work together as a team and
without each persons responsibilities the path of patient care would not flow. While reviewing
the process I gave specific details of the medical dosimetrists duties such as importing the CT
data set, contouring critical structures, keeping the work flow for the physicians to contour target
volumes and the actual treatment planning process. Since the students are early in their training I
used examples for a breast cancer patient as they would have likely seen this set up the most. I
discussed how the dosimetrist uses the breast wires and physician markings to set the tangent
fields and how dose to neighboring organs such as the heart and lungs needed to be respected
while ensuring prescription dose to the target volumes.
At the end of the presentation I was able to give the students some information if they
were interested in learning more about medical dosimetry or if they were interested in becoming
a medical dosimetrist. I urged them to spend some time in dosimetry/ physics during their
therapy training, that making the most of shadowing now while they were students would help
them once they were in the field working. I also gave them information on routes to becoming a
medical dosimetrist, eligibility criteria and the medical dosimetry certification board (MDCB)
website information.
Hopefully in promoting the field of medial dosimetry to the students at the radiation
therapy school they now have more awareness of the field and how it coincides with what they
will be doing in their future therapy careers. This was something that I would have liked to have
seen during my therapy training. In retrospect, if I was given a presentation like this early on in
my training I would have made more of an effort to get more exposure to dosimetry before
training had ended. I likely would have went right into a medical dosimetry program instead of
taking part of an on the job dosimetry program at my facility.