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PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE
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A Conversation with our Committee Chairs A little change from my normal Presidents message this time. So this time I gave all my Committee Chairs a little extra work and asked all of them a different question relating to their committee. My reason for doing this was to help you understand the amount of work and time these individuals donate to this amazing organization. It is an absolute pleasure working with every one of them. If anyone has any interest in getting involved in one of these committees to add your expertise, we welcome you to inquire and become part of that committee. If you have any questions you can email me: jstuppino@gmail.com Questions for Committee Chairs: Education Committee: Chair, Megan Cromer MEGAN: The Education Committee has been quite busy preparing the educational program for the Annual Meeting. The Program Committee has been working towards putting together an exciting and broad selection of presentations. The program looks amazing. Shawna and the Committees have been endeavoring to provide premium educational content and accreditation opportunities to maximize the value for our attendees. The Abstract and Program Chairs have been discussing and looking at ways to improve the overall experience for the attendees, which will include a different format for the presentation of the awards, highlighting the work of the Poster submissions and providing extra sessions and attendance packages available for attendees. The Joint Forum has secured what will be a very in-depth discussion of MR Safety topics, which should be a definite must see for all attending the meeting. The Home Studies Chair and On-Line Learning committee will work hard to provide the accredited online learning content from the meeting. The Abstract committee is gearing up for their busiest time - the holiday season - it is work season for the committee as they review and score the submissions for the Annual Meeting in Hawaii. The Education Committee as a whole is extremely hard working and are dedicated to providing our members high quality educational material, both on-line, and at the various Regional and Annual Meetings. Online Learning Committee: Chair, Chris Kokkinos CHRIS: There has always been an enormous amount of educational content available on our website, in the form of presentations from past meetings, printed and video home studies, and other specialized material related to areas such as MRI safety. It is a shame that much of this educational content is not accessed by many of the people visiting our website because either they do not know it is there or because what they are looking for is too difficult to find. By cataloging and grouping all our educational content into specific categories we are in essence creating an opportunity for members visiting our site to quickly and easily navigate to the exact topic that they are interested in reviewing. This will save a lot of time and make the site much more user friendly. We are also in the process of creating topic specific 'educational packages' that will fulfill the Continuing Education (CE) and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) requirements of our members. Non-members will also be able to access these educational packages for small a fee. Our goal is for the SMRT eLearning Center to become the one stop CE site for all MRI technologists and radiographers seeking to improve their MRI knowledge. Home Studies Sub-Committee: Chair, Anne Sawyer In order to obtain accreditation from the ASRT (RECEEM for the ARRT), the entire document had to be educational and could not include any articles reporting on Regional or Annual Meetings, letters from the editor and the like - so the SMRT home studies “Educational Seminars" were born! Since that time, the SMRT has been awarded RCEEM status as well and we are now able to accredit our own content. Our first home study had appeared in three parts in the Signals Newsletter as it was a comprehensive article on "Functional MRI: Capabilities and Limitations” written by Drs. Michael Moseley and Gary Glover, previously being published in a peer reviewed journal, Neuroimaging Clinics of North America. Kelly Baron was our first Home Studies editor, and given her extensive background in education for technologists, radiographers and radiologists, she brought an excellence to these publications that were second to none that were available at that time. In 2004, I took over as editor and have strived these many years to generate the quality of education that Kelly endeavored to provide to the SMRT members. Currently we have a wealth of knowledge in Home Studies available to members in the form of print and video. In 2011, we began putting videos from the SMRT and ISMRM Annual Meetings on our website in the Home Studies section that are accredited through the completion of a quiz. The beauty of it is that you are not required to complete the quiz to access the videos - only if you want the credits. I often suggest to people at MRI facilities to get a conference room, get a group of Technologists and Radiographers together, watch the videos, stop at intervals to discuss, serve popcorn! Bring your MDs and PhDs! Everything you have ever wanted to know about magnetic resonance is there. If it is not, PLEASE let me know! Going forward, we need input from the members about what they want to see in their educational offerings. The current chair of the On-Line Learning (previously Publications) Committee, Chris Kokkinos and his committee members, plus the staff in the Concord, CA, USA office have spent a great deal of time reorganizing the website and offerings to make it easier to find what you want and access it quickly and easily. Some questions we are asking: Is print better or easier than videos? Are live web presentations a more valuable learning experience than videos or print? Do we need to provide more anatomical atlases? We need you, the SMRT members, to answer those questions. Finally, we will be offering some of our educational Home Studies to non-members for a small fee. Regionals Committee: Chair, Kirsty Campbell KIRSTY: The decrease in numbers could also be due to an increase in competition from other educational providers, especially in the US. There is a view for the future to hold super Regional Meetings yearly, which will encompass several Chapters i.e.: (Northeast, Central etc.) and the individual Chapters could still hold their local meetings biannually. This will ensure high quality meetings at desirable locations attracting radiographers and technologists with the aim to increase membership growth. Abstract Committee: Chair, Dora Zeidler DORA: A board decision was made for the first time this year to add a small fee for the submission of an abstract. This fee is to cover the cost of the web-based MIRA system in which each abstract is submitted, rated and scored. This will hopefully optimize and streamline the scoring process for the Abstract Committee. All abstracts are scored from 0 to 6 where 5 to 6 is the highest possible score an abstract can achieve. The highest scoring abstract in either the clinical or research focused category will receive the President’s award. Based on the remaining scores, the additional prizes will be awarded for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in both clinical and research focused abstracts. In general terms, abstracts that are clearly and logically presented will often get high marks. I would like to emphasize for radiographers and technologists to prepare a well-developed presentation of your work and to send in your ideas and projects in an abstract for the 2017 meeting in Hawai’i. Program Committee: Chair, Shawna Farquharson SHAWNA: The Annual Meeting Program Committee (AMPC) have been working hard this past year to bring our SMRT attendees the best meeting possible for Hawai’i 2017. The theme of this year’s meeting is to ‘bridge the gap between MRI in theory, clinical practice and scientific advances’, the aim being to equip our community with knowledge to help us deliver best practice now - and in the years to come. This year’s Annual Meeting starts on Friday, 21 April with a tour of the research and clinical posters submitted this year, presentations from the poster award winners and the ceremony for all recipients of abstract awards. The Friday evening is a great networking opportunity and a celebration of the talented folks within our community, so make sure you come along and show your support. We have a fantastic start to our ‘3 day program’ this year, opening with plenary session presentations from Prof. Mark Griswold and A/Prof. Kawin Setsompop, both of whom are considered world-leaders in their field. The AMPC has ensured this year that your education program has something for everyone, with sessions focused on MRI fundamentals, Neuro, Cardiac, MSK, PET-MRI, MRI management, and last but not least, MRI safety. We have an impressive list of expert and engaging speakers from around the world who have agreed to talk at this year’s SMRT meeting. The program is designed to include perspectives from Clinicians, Physicists, Radiographers and Technologists in the majority of our focused sessions to provide an overview of the basics, an update on applications, and knowledge about emerging techniques. Changing from a 2 day to a ‘3 day meeting’ is the biggest change to the program this year. With the support of ISMRM, we have worked closely with ISMRM AMPC to deliver a 3rd day of accredited talks on Monday, 24 April that include the ISMRM plenary on Gadolinium deposition, focused sessions on Pelvic MRI, Advanced imaging of pain, MRI for neurosurgery, and MS imaging. In addition, the ISMRM-SMRT Joint Forum this year is an extension of the Sunday’s SMRT MRI safety session. The aim of this series of presentations is to deliver a program that addresses MRI safety issues from the perspectives of all MRI professionals. Finally, we have our social event booked at the Sky Waikiki Hawai’i for the evening of Saturday, 22 April. It will be a great opportunity to network with some of your fellow SMRT attendees and the SMRT speakers over a drink or two, so be sure to register early! Joint Forum Committee: Chair, Amanda Golsch SMRT Safety Committee: Chair, Vera Kimbrell VERA: The Safety Committee is in the midst of planning the first SMRT Safety Meeting tailored for Technologists and Radiographers. We are researching venues and dates that would be easy and economical for our targeted audience. The international focus on MRSO training has given rise to many Technologists and Radiographers in search of educational and professional outreach methods. As soon as we have details we'll share on the list-serve as well as on our Safety web page and various Facebook and LinkedIn pages for MRI. Also on our radar is the new RF transmit mode for 3T (and higher) MR systems. This has created new terminology and labeling challenges for the community. We are watching this development closely and participating in discussions with Safety experts. We hope soon to be able to generate educational material aimed at keeping up to date on this exciting technology. Another project on which we are focusing is the translation of MR screening forms into multiple languages. This is especially challenging so if you know a language well or have someone at your work who does please let us know. Please take a moment in your busy MR lives to visit our Safety web page. Let us know what we could do better. We welcome your input as this is designed to help Technologists and Radiographers worldwide. Membership Committee: Chair, Katrin Koziel KATRIN: The Ambassador program is tailored for members of the SMRT, such as senior technologists, physicians and teachers to raise awareness of the SMRT and the multifaceted benefits like educational programs to radiographers and technologists in training. The best investment in our future is keeping our “young ones” updated on international standards, new and exciting technologies, helping them increase their own abilities and potential and to keep them curious about what is possible in the future and be a part of that. With this program we support our Ambassadors with materials and help them create a network of international knowledge. The Affiliate member program addresses all non-radiographers/technologists who work in MRI so they may also benefit from the services SMRT provides or serve on one of the committees. At the moment our team wants to identify the needs of
technologists and radiographers around the globe. What other
services are needed to connect more people, to raise awareness of
our community. Together we can raise standards and create a safe
workplace. Local Chapters: Chair, Filip De Ridder Filip: Our committee is working together with the other chapter members from all over the world on new guidelines to address the current needs in order to organize a local meeting. Local chapters and meetings are important as those meetings are, for many local MR workers, the first contact with our organization. Of course, if anyone has an idea on how to improve or want to organize a local chapter meeting we will be happy to help and assist you. Please contact me at filip.de.ridder@telenet.be. Awards & Nominations Committee: Chair, Barry Southers Barry: Historically, awards and nominations were two separate committees. Recently, the SMRT merged these two into the Awards & Nominations Committee. Additionally, our process for supplying nominations to the SMRT membership to vote on has changed. In the past, names were put forth for both Policy Board and President-Elect, and these names were placed on the ballot for membership to vote and select candidates. This year, however, the process has changed to a much more formal, streamlined one in which all potential Policy Board and President-Elect candidates complete an application process, which includes a formal interview. In conjunction with these new steps, the SMRT governance has created a grid to properly list qualified candidates’ strengths, work styles and background, as well as geographic location and leadership qualities. In an effort to vet and subsequently select not only the best and most qualified candidates, the new process effectively outlines specific needs in our Policy Board and who the best candidates are to fill those gaps. I sincerely think it will make the nomination process much more effective. Global Relations Committee: Chair, Marty Sherriff The Global Relations Committee also awards the SMRT Travel Scholarship, which provides compensation for Technologists/Radiographers to attend the Annual Meeting. In Singapore this year, the committee was honored to award scholarships to five members from Nigeria, Sweden, Greece, Bangladesh, South Africa, Iran and Denmark. SMRT has collaborated with the Associated Sciences Committee of the RSNA and will be holding a joint forum at this year’s meeting: Safety Standards in MR - Getting More Safety ROI for your MRI. Marketing Committee: Chair, Jeff Jahn JEFF: There are three different marketing focuses that we came up with to enhance the visibility of the SMRT and the many opportunities we offer. Pay-per-click Promoted LinkedIn posts Promoted Facebook posts Finance Committee: Chair, Sheryl Foster TITTI: SMRT Bylaws went through a major revision recently and in April 2016 the revised version was presented. A major revision was necessary and streamlining our new governance structure was one of the most important reasons for these bylaw changes. The new organizational structure works very well and will allow for increased communication not only horizontally across committees but also vertically from leadership through our ad-hoc committees and back up. Examples of this have already been demonstrated in two instances: the first by including the Chair of Marketing on Membership Committee calls so that each committee can respond appropriately to new initiatives based on their committee’s role; the second was a joint effort by the Membership and Global Relations Committees in creating surveys that addressed issues surrounding the needs of non-North American radiographers and technologists. These synergies are helping the SMRT to work more effectively and efficiently and in a manner that brings different perspectives to the table around issues that are important to the MR community. Our newly revised bylaws are available to all SMRT members through this link and personal login: http://cds.ismrm.org/protected/SMRT_Members/SMRT_Bylaws_2016.pdf Jim Stuppino
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Signals is a publication produced four times per calendar year by the
International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine for the benefit of the SMRT membership and those individuals and organizations that support the educational programs and professional advancement of the SMRT and its members. The newsletter is the compilation of editor, Julie Strandt-Peay, BSM, RT (R)(MR) FSMRT, the leadership of the SMRT and the staff in the ISMRM Central Office with contributions from members and invited participants.
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