Some students graduating from Confederation College might have to wait for the technology at their job to catch up with them.
That’s because the equipment for the Medical Radiation Technology program is so new, most hospitals and clinics in the area don’t have it yet. MRT program coordinator Lorraine Lang, a student at the college herself over 20 years ago, said x-ray imaging has made the transition from film to digital much like other industries. Once a upon a time in the not-so-distant past, a medical radiation technologist would have to wait 15 minutes for one image to process.
“So if you took six or eight images on your patients you would have to wait 20 minutes or so for every examination that you did. Now those images are at a workstation or they’ve been sent to a radiologist to be read within minutes of capturing them in the x-ray rooms themselves,” Lang said at an MRT open house Thursday evening.
This technology, housed in the college’s new Regional Education Alliance for Community Health building, is so state-of-the art that some clinics and hospitals might not have it for years.
“We were fairly outdated. Now we’re actually a little bit ahead of the technology that’s being used,” Lang said.
The program only accepts 16 students. While they catch on to the technology quickly, Lang said having this equipment will help students cope with the increasing computerization and digitization of the industry.
“We’re hoping that when they go into the work world that it’s an easy transition for them,” she said.
Past graduates, current medical radiation technologists and members of the public had a chance to see the equipment in action Thursday as students took them on a tour of the classrooms and provided demonstrations.
“They will actually get to see how it works and see some of the labs and experiments that our students are doing today,” Lang said.
