Health System and Department

All of the residency and fellowship programs, including the Imaging Physics Residency, are supported by Duke University Medical Center, one of the premier integrated health care delivery systems in the country. With over 13,600 full-time employees, a 967 member house staff (interns, residents and fellows) of physicians, three hospitals, multiple ambulatory centers, home health care, and other health-related entities located throughout the North Carolina Triangle area, Duke University Health System is one of the largest and most respected health systems in the nation. It attracts more than 61,000 inpatient stays and 1.8 million outpatient visits annually. For the 24th year in a row, Duke University Medical Center has been named one of the top U.S. hospitals by U.S. News & World Report, including being #1 in North Carolina.

The Radiology Department performs over 500,000 examinations each year, including over 4,000 PET exams, 16,000 other nuclear medicine procedures, 270,000 projection radiography procedures, 100,000 computed tomography studies, 30,000 mammography exams, 30,000 interventional procedures, and 30,000 MRI studies.

Imaging Equipment

Residents have access to clinical imaging equipment maintained by the Duke Department of Radiology at the Duke University Medical Center, as well as neighboring Duke Clinics and Duke Children’s Hospital. Duke Radiology uses state-of-the-art digital radiological equipment including computed radiography and direct digital radiography systems, digital fluoroscopy, and flat panel interventional systems. The clinical imaging equipment at the facility includes 49 general radiography rooms, 47 C-arm systems, 21 general R/F rooms, 35 portable systems, 9 vascular radiology rooms, 24 mammography systems, 15 computed tomography systems; 136 ultrasound systems; 16 nuclear medicine systems including SPECT and PET, 17 MRI systems, and 20 cardiac catheterization labs. As developing technology and procedures become routine in clinical practice, they are added to the resident’s training.

Information Technologies

Duke University Medical Center also has a comprehensive electronic medical record system into which the Department of Radiology’s Visage PACS has been integrated. During the summer of 2013, Duke University Health System (DUHS) became the first provider in the greater Triangle to implement the country's leading electronic health record (EHR) system, Epic (Duke project name: Maestro Care). This multi-year project effectively created a "one-record, one-patient" system that consolidated and eliminated a total of 130 separate clinical IT systems.

Workspace

State-of-the-art research laboratory space on the Duke Campus includes 15,000 square feet in the Bryan Research Building, 7,000 square feet in the Carl E. Ravin Advanced Imaging (RAI) Labs, and 5,000 square feet for the Medical Physics Graduate Program in Hock Plaza. Residents also have access to the Duke School of Engineering machine shop.

Access

Residents have access to clinical equipment through the CIPG physicists, who aid in scheduling testing with the clinical staff. Equipment is typically available after clinical hours, but acceptance testing and testing following repairs frequently takes place during typical clinical hours. The CIPG staff train residents on the safe and proper use of equipment, oversee the residents during equipment use, and ensure equipment is left in the proper state for clinical use.