Sanford medical device maker .decimal Inc. will become a satellite location for a new graduate program in radiation physics starting this fall. It’s designed to address a global shortage of medical physicists and dosimetrists.
“There is a considerable demand for both medical physicists and dosimetrists,” said John Barton, administrative director of radiation oncology for Florida Hospital’s Cancer Institute and a medical physicist.
Medical physicists work with radiation oncologists to design treatment plans and monitoring equipment and procedures to ensure cancer patients get the prescribed dose of radiation at the correct location. Medical dosimetrists do the measurement and calculation of radiation doses for the treatment of cancer patients.
And demand for them is expected to grow, as the U.S. has an aging population and more early cancer diagnostic technology emerging, said Yashan Zhang, physicist at Central Florida Cancer Care Center in Sanford. There are only 4,000 medical physicists in the U.S.
The shortage is even worse in South America and Asia — Japan only has 80 certified medical physicists.
In addition, there are few accredited medical physics training programs. There are only 15 accredited graduate programs in medical physics in the U.S. — including one at the University of Florida, said College Park, Md.-based Commission on Accreditation of Medical Physics Educational Programs Inc. There are just two graduate dosimetry programs in the U.S.: at the University of Southern Illinois and the Medical College of Georgia.
Starting this fall, .decimal will be a site for South Bend, Ind.-based Radiological Technologies University VT’s classes for future medical physicists and dosimetrists. In addition, the school will film online courses at .decimal’s production studio at 121 Central Park Place. Ken Cashon, .decimal’s vice president of medical physics, will be an instructor.
Brent Murphy, founder and president of Radiological Technologies University VT, will open a second satellite in Los Angeles this year and others in Japan, China and Brazil in 2010.
The class at .decimal will start Sept. 30 with four to six students. Radiological Technologies University VT, which opened in July, will launch its first medical physicist class Sept. 9 with 10-12 students in Indiana.
Local students can attend classes full time at the .decimal satellite location or take classes online. Tuition is $25,000 a year for the medical physics program and $17,500 annually for the medical dosimetry programs. Both are two-year programs, and students must have at least a bachelor’s degree before applying. The school has applied for accreditation with Florida, Indiana and California.
.Decimal CEO Richard Sweat, who has known Murphy professionally for years, said his company and the school also will partner on training in conjunction with .decimal’s products, but .decimal doesn’t have ownership in the school, which will complement the growing medical and biotech industries in Central Florida.
Cashon anticipates the new program will attract candidates with a background in engineering or the sciences. “A lot of engineers are getting laid off,” he said. “And there’s this void in the market.”
Once students complete this type of program, they typically do a two-year residency, which pays between $30,000 to $60,000 a year.
After that, annual salaries for medical physicists range from $100,000 to $250,000, and medical dosimetrists earn between $80,000 to $140,000 yearly, said the latest survey by the American Association of Physicists in Medicine and American Association of Medical Dosimetrists. Said Barton, “It’s a very rewarding career financially.”
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