Medical Physics Poised for Future
The countdown is on nationwide for students interested in pursuing a career in the burgeoning field of medical physics, where only a small percentage of the graduate programs are accredited.
Columbia Engineering’s Master’s Program in Medical Physics is already prepared, having recently beaten the clock by earning its prized accreditation from the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Physics Educational Programs (CAMPEP).
“It’s important because everything’s going to change as far as the medical physics community is concerned,” says Edward L. Nickoloff, a professor of radiology who teaches in the program.
Starting in 2012, students must graduate from an accredited program in order to sit for their board certification exams in medical physics. Columbia’s is one of just 21 programs nationwide that is accredited and is one of just two in the Ivy League.
Medical physics is the application of physics to medicine, often in medical imaging and radiotherapy. In hospitals, graduates from these MS programs typically work in research, technical development, and clinical healthcare. Innovators in the field are responsible for numerous essential diagnostic technologies, including CT (computerized tomography) and PET (positron emission tomography) scans.
What the accreditation also accomplishes for a program is to validate its quality, says co-director I. Cevdet Noyan, Professor of Materials Science (Henry Krumb School of Mines) and of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics. The program has two directors, one in SEAS (Noyan) and one at the Medical Center, Professor Cheng-Shie Wuu, Professor of Clinical Radiation Oncology, who is the program’s professional adviser.
“We have a small program with a great student-to-teacher ratio of less than 4-1,” Noyan says.
That opportunity for direct faculty contact has resulted in an increase in the number and quality of applicants, says radiology Professor Peter Esser. The emphasis remains on the quality of the program, he says.
“They will be Columbia graduates,” he says, “and, implicit in that is that they will receive the very best education possible in their field.”
The program faculty includes professors from three Columbia schools, the College of Physicians and Surgeons, the Mailman School of Public Health, and The Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science, and is based in the latter’s Department of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics.
“We emphasize the physics,” Noyan says.
Most students enter the field immediately after finishing the Masters’ program, often in high-paying jobs at hospitals and clinics, the professors say. Some continue on in related PhD programs, typically pursuing a clinical or a research career in an academic or hospital environment
“I came to Columbia because the Master's Program gave me a conduit into the PhD program in Applied Physics,” says Owen Clancey MS’07. “The fact that I could show my worth as an MS student carried weight when applying for the PhD.”
Clancey’s emphasis in the MS program was radiation therapy. He praised professors in the program, who were accessible and key to helping him obtain work afterward.
Clancey, whose career goal is to be a chief medical physicist at a major hospital, is currently working as a medical physicist at Winthrop University Hospital in Mineola, NY, while he continues work on his PhD dissertation, with a goal of defending it next year.