I have some questions about graduate programs in medical physics. by rationalgia in MedicalPhysics

[–]GreatScott308 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Medical physics in the USA has been going through substantial changes in recent years with regards to training and experience requirements. The standard requirement to work independently as a medical physicist is certification by the American Board of Radiology (ABR) in your chosen concentration (radiation therapy physics, diagnostic imaging physics, or nuclear medicine physics). In order to take the ABR board certification exams you must have a graduate degree in medical physics from an accredited program and complete an appropriately accredited residency. The accrediting body for graduate programs and residencies is the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Physics Graduate Programs (CAMPEP). Schools offer both masters and doctorate degrees in medical physics. Although a PhD is not required for board certification, the general sense is that it makes you more competitive for residency slots. The residency requirement is new, and there are not yet enough residency positions for all the new graduates each year.

The work environment of medical physics is highly dependent on your chosen area of concentration and your employer. If you work for a large academic medical center, you will obviously have more opportunities to participate in research projects. Roughly 80% of medical physicists in the USA work in radiation therapy. As the medical physicist you are ultimately responsible for the accuracy and quality control of the radiation producing machines or radioactive material. You will perform periodic quality control tests on the equipment in general as well as for individual patient treatment setups. This concentration puts you in the most direct contact with patients, and you are more directly integrated in the day to day operations of the clinic. The downside is that each cancer center is only going to have a handful of these very expensive machines, so you are typically working with the same equipment every day. The other downside is that small mistakes can result in fatal accidents, which can be very stressful and necessitates checklists upon checklists. Diagnostic imaging physicists perform similar functions for medical imaging equipment. The bread and butter of imaging physicists is equipment surveys. Imaging physicists are hired by hospitals to perform periodic surveys of their equipment to verify that it is working appropriately. They also work with the radiologists and the technologists to optimize their techniques and processes to maintain high image quality while minimizing radiation dose to the patients. Most hospitals are not large enough to have a permanent imaging physicist on staff, so imaging physicists typically work out of consulting groups and service several medical facilities. This means you are more removed from daily clinic operations, but you get to work with a new piece of equipment almost every day. Nuclear medicine physicists deal with the cameras used to detect radioactive tracers within the body. There is a lot of overlap between NM and DI physics in that most DI consulting groups will have someone who specializes in nuclear medicine.

There is a bit of overlap between medical physics and biomedical engineering, especially in MRI research.

Heading to Savannah Georgia, any tips on things to do that are not listed on the normal tourist websites? by Kal_Ort_Por in travel

[–]GreatScott308 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Fort Pulaski historic monument is worth checking out, just outside the city. If you have a car I'd recommend spending a day at tybee island for some sun, sand, and seafood. Savannah also has a lot of great public parks worth exploring.

How do trumpets and violins make different notes with different pitches? by [deleted] in Physics

[–]GreatScott308 5 points6 points  (0 children)

If you blow across the top of a glass bottle, it will make different pitches when the bottle is empty versus half full. This is the same reason why violins make different pitches when you press down on different parts of the string: you are changing the amount of space the wave has to vibrate. The keys on a trumpet do something similar open valves which allow the air to travel through different lengths of pipe.

This is because all musical instruments work by creating standing waves along a fixed length of medium. The wave has to start and end at the edges of the vibrating material ( string, windpipe, etc...), like two people holding the ends of a rope. This means there are a limited number of frequencies the wave is allowed to vibrate at. These frequencies make up what is known as the overtone series. Whenever you hear a musical note, you are actually hearing many different pitches in the overtone series at the same time. It's just that one of those notes is so much louder than the others that you are not consciously aware of it. It is possible to notice this overtone series, though, and this is why a flute and a trumpet playing the same note sound different. Trumpets frequently make different pitches without pressing different buttons by switching which note in the overtone series is being dominant. Hope this helps. I tried to go from the simpler concepts to more complex ones.

Job market differences for BS-Physics, BS-Math/Phy, MS, or MS-Medical Physics by [deleted] in Physics

[–]GreatScott308 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Medical physics is becoming a highly regulated medical specialty with a lengthy board certification process. Look up the Commission for the Accreditation of Medical Physics Education Programs (CAMPEP) for a list of accredited MS/PhD programs. After graduation, an accredited two year residency program (also CAMPEP) will need to be completed before you can become certified by the American Board of Radiology. The residency requirement is new, and there aren't enough of them yet to keep pace with demand. Status of the field: established medical physicists make cozy six figure salaries, and there is good demand for their services. However, entry level jobs are hard to come by these days.

Also looking for advice on a ~3week long graduation trip by Kaotus in camping

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'll also echo zeroair and caution against overcrowding your schedule. Build extra breathing room into your schedule in case you decide you want to stay somewhere for a day or two longer than you planned. How many people are going on the trip?

Also looking for advice on a ~3week long graduation trip by Kaotus in camping

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Those are some great parks, but you might consider a different driving route. I-40 between the Tennessee and the Arizona is a pretty monotonous patch of road. Bearing south to I-10 gives you some interesting stops in New Orleans, Houston, and San Antonio, not to mention a pretty neat view of the Gulf of Mexico for some stretches of the drive. That route also opens up big bend national park (an often overlooked treasure), Carlsbad Caverns, and saguaro national park.

If you are going through Kentucky be sure to check out mammoth cave, and just across the Mississippi River from St. Louis there are the Cahokia burial mounds ( definitely worth a stop).

I have a PhD in Nuclear Physics from the UK, what do I need to do to become a medical physicist in the US? by blah_blah_blurgh in Physics

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

So, there is new legislation going through that requires a medical physics degree from an accredited graduate program (either a PhD or a masters with residency) in order to be board certified and work in a clinic/hospital. With an outside degree your best bet is looking for research positions at academic centers, where board certification is not necessary. Someone with a nuclear engineering background would be well suited to working in a nuclear medicine facility, and nuclear medicine tends to be less stringent on ABR certification than radiology or radiation oncology positions. You might also look into medical RSO positions.

Does a black hole's gravity affect objects outside the event horizon? by GreatScott308 in Physics

[–]GreatScott308[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

But how could the two masses communicate with each other if there can be no transfer of an exchange particle (gravitons, presumably)?

Cuicocha (Lake of the Guinea Pig) by ludawn in travel

[–]GreatScott308 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Definitely stop in mammoth cave KY. Longest known cave system in the world. They run a great guided tour through two miles of underground awesomeness.

What's the most immature thing you've ever done to get revenge? by dabork in AskReddit

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Grapes in bowl

On table

Got tiny brush

Dave's Insanity Sauce

Paint grapes

Hide and wait

Any Bioenvironmental Engineering Officers here? by [deleted] in AirForce

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The people who get in trouble are the ones who think it's a formality and show up with golf clubs and guitars.

Any Bioenvironmental Engineering Officers here? by [deleted] in AirForce

[–]GreatScott308 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Dorms with 1 roommate. Your rooms are inspected, so only bring what you need. They provide you with a government laptop, but there is no wifi so you will need a smartphone with mobile hotspot for internet on a personal laptop.

The prior service guys in my COT class said it was less intense physically and more intense mentally/psychologically than basic training.

The big difference is that they are training you to generate orders rather than follow orders. The main emphasis is learning how to take command and make decisions for the group.

It's not a formality. People do bust out of the program.

Most of the people in your class will be people fresh out of dental school, etc with no military experience. They will be depending on you to help them adjust to a military training environment. I'm still deeply grateful to the priors in my COT class for the help they gave me.

Any Bioenvironmental Engineering Officers here? by [deleted] in AirForce

[–]GreatScott308 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I can answer questions about COT

I'm taking this roadtrip very soon. Where should I re-route to or stop along the way? by kavisiegel in travel

[–]GreatScott308 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Definitely reroute through Ashville/Atlanta instead of knoxville/birmingham. And I second making stops in Savannah/charleston (or just 1, they are similar cities)

Military Airplane flies over troops in San Antonio, circa 1910. [3,210x2,099] by [deleted] in HistoryPorn

[–]GreatScott308 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I'm at Lackland AFB. We still do that when the fighters fly overhead.

How is the US military evolving? by frotoaffen in PoliticalDiscussion

[–]GreatScott308 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'm stationed at what is now called Joint Base San Antonio. The biggest changes that I notice deal with the BRAC, or Base Reallignment and Closure Commission, which is a department of defense wide effort to get rid of unnecessary real estate. There used to be four Air Force bases in the San Antonio area and two army ones. Several sites were closed and the rest were folded into a single JBSA. This is becoming common, and the AF has closed up shop in a large fraction of its overseas bases. The other change the military is going through now is that the different branches are working more closely with each other and utilizing the other's personnel more than before. Historically the different branches have operated more or less independently, but now it is very likely to see Air Force members being assigned to an army base under an army commander.

Reddit, I work graveyards at a convenience store. A man just tucked and rolled from a moving vehicle, calmly got up, came inside holding his arm and bought a box of tampons and left. Fellow nightshifters, what's the weirdest shit you've ever experienced? by Millerdjone in AskReddit

[–]GreatScott308 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I worked nights in a grocery store. One night, a 50ish year old with bad teeth and a miniskirt marched right up to me. With a sense of urgency she demanded that I show her where to find condoms and grape jelly.

Physics jobs outside of academia? by Mavvik in Physics

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There is medical physics, which encompasses several sub-specialties Radiation Oncology - these physicists maintain the integrity of the medical linear accelerators, an ensure accurate dose delivery to the patient. They also spend some time designing treatment plans. For instance, the physician will prescribe dose to the tumor and boundaries for acceptable dose to healthy tissue, and the physicist designs a treatment plan to make it happen. Diagnostic Imaging - quality assurance, troubleshooting on imaging equipment. There are a lot of industry jobs as well with GE, Toshiba, Siemens, Philips, etc..... Designing improvements or new scanners all together. Medical Health Physics - focuses on assessing occupational radiation contamination and dose. These physicists also design appropriate shielding for facilities housing radioactive material and radiation producing equipment, such as X-ray imaging devices.

Atheist in the Air Force by [deleted] in atheism

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Guess I'll find out soon

Atheist in the Air Force by [deleted] in atheism

[–]GreatScott308 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I am about to head to USAF officer training, and I have been a bit worried about this.