Call a medical physicist: a guide to troubleshooting

A catastrophic problem may occur when an imaging system suddenly fails. In most cases, however, a problem comes on gradually until the imaging quality is so far degraded it becomes clinically unacceptable. In that circumstance, pressure is put on the technologist to do something quickly to improve the quality of the images. There are several guidelines to follow when a similar situation occurs in your workplace. First, any correction should be made rationally using the data at hand. Don't rush to change a lot of things all at once or you'll never know what did work. Putting in a call to a physicist may be in your best interest as the second step to follow. A qualified diagnostic medical physicist has an overview of the principals and applied technology of the imaging process. Both the radiologic technologist and the technical representative from film or x-ray and film processor companies have training in all areas of x-ray technology. It is the physicists' many years of training in the application of scientific methods to medical imaging problems that provide an edge in diagnosing technical problems. Their strength is that they are good with scientific concepts and numbers. Don't let the physicist leave until the problem has been shown to be solved. Bring in the service engineer to run a control strip to show that the remedy has indeed had the desired effect with no undesirable side-effects. Document the problem and the solution is the fourth rule, while rule five is to use the physicist to coordinate the process, objectively measure and assess the results of any change. You'll be back on line more quickly and will know what went wrong.