University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust

Here at UHNM you will be welcomed into the Medical Physics team which includes 21 clinical scientists who provide cover across the four specialisms.  All four rotations will be at the Royal Stoke site with your university placement at Liverpool.  As a department we have been successfully training scientists since the last century and you will follow in the steps of and benefit from the support of the existing second and third year trainees.  In the past we have been fortunate to offer some of our trainees a permanent position; the latest of which will be starting with us after qualifying in 2023.  Below is a brief description of the departments you will be working in.  The Diagnostic Radiology Physics department provides support and advice for several busy Hospital Trusts including The University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust.  The department undertakes routine testing of wide range X-ray equipment including CT scanners, Mammography equipment and General X-ray units to ensure their performance meets current national guidelines, in accordance with current UK Legislation.  In addition the department provides advice with regards X-ray room design as well as ensuring radiation doses to staff, patients and members of the public remain appropriate.  The nuclear medicine department at Royal Stoke University Hospital has three gamma cameras, a PET scanner and performs over 100 radionuclide therapies per year. We have commissioned two new state-of-the-art SPECT-CT systems in 2023 and will be commissioning a new PET-CT system this year. The SPECT-CT systems offer our patients 3-D quantification of radiotracer uptake which will be especially helpful when expanding our radionuclide therapy service. The Radiotherapy department is a Varian site consisting of two Halcyons, two Truebeams, a Gammamed HDR unit, an Xstrahl unit, a Siemens RT go Sim CT scanner and Ecilpse treatment planning system. We are involved with several radiotherapy trials, and provide SABR, VMAT, IMRT, conformal, 4DCT and DIBH treatment techniques with 2d kV and MV imaging and 3d kV and MV CBCT imaging. We are in the process of procuring surface guided radiation therapy. We also provide an iodine ablation service and a brachytherapy needle service. The MRI and Ultrasound Physics team is a small team of scientists who are dedicated to improving patient care using non-ionising imaging. We support a busy MRI department, operating 7 MRI scanners, as well as providing support to other local Trusts. Non-ionising imaging is a rapidly growing field, due to the increasing demand and complexity of scans. We therefore have an urgent need to train more scientists in this area. We are passionate about providing the highest quality training in areas such as QA, safety and image optimisation. At UHNM the physics team work closely with the clinical radiology team, meaning that even as a trainee you will directly see how your work impacts patient care.