“Master in Medical Physics”: Recommendations for Training Programs

The Ukrainian Association of Medical Physicists (UAMF) developed and published “Recommendations to Develop the Master’s Program (or Academic Part of the Residency) in Medical Physics”. The IAEA document “Postgraduate Medical Physics Academic Programme. Training Course Series 56. IAEA, Vienna, 2013” was taken as the basis for the Recommendations, as so was the experience in implementing the Master Program “Master in Medical Physics” accredited by the International Organization of Medical Physics (IOMP), which is used for training in the International Center for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) jointly with the University of Trieste.

These Recommendations are the first part of the project “Expert in Medical Physics” (with subsequent residency, licensing and continuous professional growth) aimed at improving the level of professionalism and qualification of medical physicists and, as a result, the authority of medical physicists in medicine.

An important part of training of a qualified clinical medical physicist (expert in medical physics) is the master’s program. Several universities in Ukraine train masters in the field of medical physics today. The problem is that, according to existing training programs, graduates do not obtain enough knowledge and practical skills for further practical activity in clinics. These programs do not meet the requirements of the European Union and the IAEA. Therefore, the community of medical physicists of Ukraine has developed relevant recommendations to support higher educational institutions in Ukraine. They provide a basic list of courses (modules), according to which a medical physicist should pass a training and acquire knowledge.

“We hope that the higher educational institutions of Ukraine that train or plan training of qualified medical physicists will consider these recommendations and improve their curricula in accordance with them,” UAMF President Ruslan Zelinsky expresses his hope.

The goal in developing these recommendations was not aimed at drawing up of a complete training program so as not to limit universities in choosing additional courses and modules. The courses of the basic list should be included into the university training programs to provide a complete and integral training for future medical physics specialists, on which the quality of medical services is dependent to no small degree.

The final revision of the recommendations was approved by the current members of the Association and obtained positive feedback of the SNRIU.

According to UAMF