Leadership and the medical physicist!

The first day statement of my high school physics teacher was: “You can find physics in all aspects in our life”. Of course, everybody in class laughed out loud and each one of us started challenging the teacher with many things in our life we thought had nothing to do with physics. The confident teacher will answer all inquiries and questions and trace it back to physical phenomena. That was the astonishing moment where all students started to like the class and wait eagerly to discover and learn about physics and its application in our life.

International Day of Medical Physics (IDMP) celebrations started in 2013 and from that year, the event developed rapidly among medical physics communities worldwide. Every year, additional taste is added to the event like the yearly theme, the corresponding posters, outstanding seminars, songs, supportive walks/rides, T-Shirts, amusement events, quizzes nights and gifts distributions, prizes and medals awarding for pioneer physicists and many other wonderful gears all to enjoy our IDMP. Although Covid19 has affected our celebrations as many other events around the world, the IDMP celebrations kept alive and many countries continued to mark this day with many activities some of which were virtual but many adapted safety measures and did their best to show our pride of being medical physicists.

This year, IOMP’s adopted theme is “Communicating the Role of Medical Physicists to the Public”. The main aim behind adopting this theme is to educate the public about our role as leaders in the field specifying that Medical Physicists do the following:

• 1. Take the lead in optimizing the use of radiation to treat cancer.

• 2. Estimate radiation doses from radiological imaging procedures.

• 3. Teach doctors, radiological technologists and nurses about the radiations used in imaging and treatment.

• 4. Are responsible for radiation safety of patients and staff.

• 5. Understand newer imaging and therapy technologies and train others to use them

These common terms are easily understood by the general public whom they have little information about our roles in the hospital being a Therapy, Diagnostic, Nuclear Medicine or Safety Medical Physics Specialists. Leadership and medical physicist are two sides of the same coin. To be successful as a leader, the Medical Physicist should have the will to work on improving his or her moral purpose.

“Moral purpose relates to both ends and means. An important end is to make a difference in the lives of customers or clients (internal and external). But the means of getting to that end are also crucial. A leader who doesn’t treat others well and fairly will be a leader without followers. Of course, leading with integrity is not just instrumental. To strive to improve the quality of how we live together is a moral purpose of the highest order.” Said Michael Fullan in his book Leading in a Culture of Change.

Thus, our work is devoted to improve lives of our patients by implementing the best available technological advances in our profession which requires from us to be competent medical physicists striving the finest learning and training opportunities. This also requires from us to perform our duties in serving our patients and treating them with dignity and fairness for all.

With more than 20 years of experience in the profession and as many of my colleagues, we have learned that medical physics is not only a career to work in a hospital or to teach at a university, it is a way of seeing and experiencing life. “We do not teach you only how to use radiation in diagnosis or treatment of cancer, we also teach you to be the problem solvers in anything you encounter in your life” said Dr. Colin Orton, Professor Emirates of Medical Physics Department at Wayne State University in Michigan, USA. And this is what a medical physicist really is; be a leader in your professional career as well as in your personal life.