WE‐F‐213‐01: Building, Maintaining and Improving Physics Residency Programs
In this session we will discuss the key steps for building, maintaining and improving a physics residency program. The initial momentum starts with a secure commitment of; a program director, physics faculty, physicians, key technical personnel, and, of course, administration. The ultimate goal is to build a strong clinical physicist who practice independently and/or work in an interdisciplinary team. Part of the initiation is to find out the right balance of training, resident empowerment, and service contributed back to the clinic.
Another key step that will be discussed is the recruitment of resident candidates. Namely, where the residents are coming from, what their educational background is, and most importantly during interviews, how to gauge what makes an ideal resident. Experiences on the first year of Medphys Match will be shared as well as strategies for placement following graduation.
The key to maintenance of a residency program is to not allow stagnation, but rather to constantly update. Examples will be given of evolution of programs in terms of the didactic and clinical rotational components. In addition, how to allocate the resident developmental work, whether it be clinical or benchmark, without disrupting training. We will also discuss how to evaluate faculty on the ownership they take regarding resident training. We will discuss both therapy and imaging programs.
Finally, we will share experiences on steps to continually improve one’s program.
Learning Objectives:
1. 
To obtain from the experience of long standing programs the lessons learned.
2. 
To find out what historically has worked out to be ideal resident candidates.
3. 
Guidelines for continually improving a program.