Radiologic Sciences & Imaging
By KEN MOSIER
For What2Be
Who am I?
Name: Larry Beneke
Title: Program Director, Radiologic Sciences & Imaging
Affiliation: Kettering College of Medical Arts
Education: Bachelor’s Degree, Biology, Heidelberg College, Ohio
Associate Degree, Radiology, Fullerton Community College, California
Master’s Degree, Education, University of Dayton
Quote: “If someone has a liking for this kind of technology, medical imaging with data interpretation is really cool,” he said.
What’s2Like:
►Cutting edge technology.
►Helping patients.
►Decent pay.
►Wide variety of career paths.
►Good job opportunities (in many areas).
What’s Not 2 Like:
►Shift work is a possibility.
►Long periods of standing.
►As are all hospital workers, exposed to diseases.
►Trauma situations can be gut-wrenching.
If you’re the type who loves cutting-edge technology, likes caring for patients and are good in the math and science fields, Larry Beneke thinks you should consider a career in medical imaging.
“There are lots of career paths,” said the Professor and Program Director of Radiologic Sciences and Imaging at Kettering College of Medical Arts. “If they don’t like radiology (generally x-rays), they can do computed tomography (CT Scan) or (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) or mammography, management, education, research, dosimetry (figuring out how much radiation people are getting) — just lots of different career paths for medical imaging people.”
Beneke is a radiologic technologist and is a certified computed tomography technologist as well. He started out with a degree in biology from Heidelberg College in Tiffin, Ohio. Then he joined the Navy where he was made a medical corpsman. He served time doing a lot of radiological imaging in Rota, Spain, where he was stationed on board a submarine tender. Then he was transferred to the Fleet Marine Force in California (the Navy supplies medics for the Marine Corps) where he began a family and eventually was discharged.
“My desire was to be a physical therapist after I got out. I was living in California and the wait list at Long Beach Community College was so long and I had a family so I said, ‘I am going to do something else.’” Beneke enrolled in Fullerton Community College and got an associate degree in radiology. “My biology degree helped me with understanding human structure and pathology and all that. And then the hospital corps experiences certainly helped me with patient care so I had a huge leg up on the other radiographers that were in my training program,” he added.
Afterwards he took his master’s degree in educational administration from the University of Dayton.
Although it is currently possible to get certified as a medical imaging technician without a degree, Beneke said he expects that to change in the near future. “There is a two-year educational experience — either as a hospital-based program or a college-based program,” he explained. “College-based programs are pre-eminent now and the bulk of x-ray programs are based on an associate level in college. (In) hospital-based, there would be a diploma or a certificate of completion but they would have the same parameters of the radiologic sciences education as the college-based person — they just wouldn’t have the general education or other didactic courses.
“That is changing a little bit because even the hospital-based courses are being required to have some college if not a degree,” he added.
Medical imaging technicians and technologists are responsible for producing the medical images ordered by physicians. The images they produce would then go to a radiologist — an MD or DO — for interpretation. They also work directly with a doctor when making images of procedures such as a fluoroscope where a patient drinks barium or any time that a patient is injected with a contrast material.
“We are not nurses but we certainly have patient-care skills,” Beneke said. “Our patient care is in small bites. X-Ray technologists may see a given patient for five or 10 minutes and then they may never see them again, where a nurse takes care of patients for a longer period of time.”
A medical imaging technician is entry level. “There are primary medical imaging technologies: radiologic technology; nuclear medicine technology; radiation therapy; and also sonography,” Beneke explained. “Those are the primary fields that an entry level person could get into.
“From that primary level, there is advanced training in computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, mammography, angiography — the heart cath kinds of examination — and some others like PET (Positron Emission Tomography) that is more like nuclear medicine. But you have to have an entry-level, primary modality certificate before you can get to the advanced roles.”
More and more the requirement is for certified techs in whatever test is being done. “In the past, people had just gotten on-the-job training in one of those areas. Now because of the regulations and insurance reimbursement, more and more requirements are being placed to become certified in the advanced modalities.
“That’s not 100 percent yet but the industry is going that way,” he concluded.
Beneke said hospitals are by far the biggest employers of medical imaging technologists but techs can also be found in physicians’ offices, in imaging clinics and in mobile imaging services.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics Handbook (www.bls.gov) projects that the need for medical imaging techs is expected to grow faster than normal and that those with certification in more than one area are more employable. Beneke agrees in principle but says that the job market in the local area is somewhat stagnant right now because of the number of techs being turned out in Southwestern Ohio. “There are jobs out there and our graduates eventually find work. Five or 10 years ago, we couldn’t turn them out quickly enough.
“If students are willing to move out of the Dayton/Miami Valley area, their chances are good. If they have a second certificate, it certainly improves their chances of getting a job,” he said.
