In her final report from the recent Australian Society of Medical Imaging and Radiation conference, Marie McInerney brings advice on dealing with imposter syndrome, building a cohesive professional identity, making workplaces more supportive for part-time workers and mothers, and supporting students who live with neurodiverse conditions during clinical placements.
Don’t miss the video interviews with key presenters, conference photos and links to many useful resources.
Marie McInerney writes:
What does it take to thrive, both personally and professionally?
This question was addressed, in different ways, by many presenters at ASMIRT2024, and our final report from the conference presents a smorgasbord of takeaways from across the four-day program.
1. Forging a visible global medical imaging and radiation therapy identity
A worldwide shortage of qualified workers, variations in entry level and qualifications, and lack of access to medical radiation healthcare for many poorer nations are the top three pressing issues for the medical imaging and radiation therapy professions globally.
That’s the verdict from Steve Lacey, a Melbourne-based radiographer, who is director of education for the International Society of Radiographers and Radiological Technologists (ISRRT), which represents 90 member societies worldwide and 500,000 medical radiation science professionals.
Lacey presented to #ASMIRT2024 on the role of the ISRRT and how it has been working to establish a stronger identity and profile for the professions it represents.
A 2015 survey exploring standard classification of occupations found there were 21 different names applied to the professions across the world, including the Swedish term ‘x-ray nurse’.
“How are we supposed to establish ourselves as a global profession if we … have all of these names?” he asked.
There’s also significant variation in entry level education, context of the radiography role, and scope of practice, he said. For example, in some countries, like Australia, a four-year undergraduate degree allows a student to do medical imaging, radiotherapy or nuclear medicine, while students in other countries can do all three together, while others graduate with a two year diploma.
Such variation in terms and qualifications makes for an “invisible global professional identity,” Lacey told #ASMIRT. “It’s really hard to say to the world, ‘we are one standard profession’”, he said, describing efforts by the ISRRT to standardise education frameworks and adopt official terminology for the professions as radiographers or radiologic technologists.
Lacey, who worked at the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) in Melbourne for 15 years before moving now to be director of education at ASMIRT, also presented at the conference on ‘Confessions of a Podcaster’.
As an RCH allied health outreach educator, he has been involved in the broadcast of two podcasts: Teach Think Treat, a clinical education tool for students, and Conversation with the Experts on paediatric healthcare.
His key tip for podcasters? Don’t read from a script.
Watch this interview with Steve Lacey
2. Part-time is not code for giving up
‘Mumography – super skill or career killer?’ That was the sharp question posed on behalf of Australian radiographers who go back to work part-time after having children.
In a funny and furious presentation, coincidentally delivered on Mother’s Day at #ASMIRT2024, Sally Bellchambers, a senior radiographer at Garran Medical Imaging who also works as a casual radiographer at North Canberra Hospital, outlined a troubling journey of inequity and discrimination in her work following the birth of her three children.
“To say my career stalled would be incorrect,” she said. “It went into reverse, I was demoted, denied and demoralised.”
Bellchambers told the Resilience session of the conference that she had enjoyed a strong upwards career trajectory after graduating. But that all changed after she had kids.
She hit multiple obstacles, including being told there was no question, as a part-timer, she could maintain her previous managerial role.
Did she think the world owed her special consideration because she made the conscious decision to procreate?, Bellchambers asked rhetorically.
“No, but I do hold the crazy notion that I shouldn’t be punished for it either,” she said, noting that of Australia’s 18,723 practising radiographers, 69 percent were women and one-third worked part-time.
She has since been able to regain “some of the professional status that I had earnt and deserved”.
But the experience rankled on a wider structural level. Ahead of the ASMIRT conference, she surveyed others working in radiography across Australia, receiving nearly 100 responses, 89 percent of which were from women, the majority working in public hospitals.
Many also reported that they felt part-time employees were undervalued at work, had felt less respected as part-timers, and felt their part-time status meant they didn’t stand a chance of promotion.
Bellchambers told the session she hadn’t decided whether it was “ironic, symbolic or just a little bit bonkers that it’s Mother’s Day and instead of having breakfast in bed and cuddles, I am here speaking about the likelihood that motherhood, while absolutely a choice and privilege, remains a shackle on the majority of those hoping to maintain upward career trajectory”.
Closing her presentation to strong applause, she urged delegates to take back to their workplaces some key points, including:
- Do not discount part-time colleagues: part time is not code for giving up, it is not a participation award, we are not space fillers.
- Parental leave does not signal giving up career aspirations, women have babies not lobotomies…
3. Dealing with imposter syndrome
Professor Gill Harrison says she could deliver her presentation on ‘imposter syndrome’ at pretty much every occupational conference around the globe, such is its prevalence in the workforce, regardless of gender or background.
But working to defeat the debilitating mindset is particularly important for her own radiography profession, she said.
“I think a lot of radiographers undersell their skills and abilities,” she told Croakey at #ASMIRT2024 after presenting a workshop on ‘working with your imposter voice’.
“We’re not good as a profession at going out and shouting what we can do and what we do and how good we are. I really want to empower radiographers and student radiographers and sonographers to go out there and say…we can do this!” she said.
Harrison brings an impressive pedigree. An experienced UK sonographer/radiographer, she is currently Professional Officer (Ultrasound) at the Society and College of Radiographers and a Principal Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (PFHEA). She has worked globally, including in Uganda and co-led on the development of standards for sonographic education.
Yet, she said, the imposter syndrome, or phenomenon as she calls it, is certainly something she has experienced “a lot over the years” — as do others, she said, citing studies that show probably 60-70 percent of adults have imposter thoughts from time to time.
Original investigations of the concept focused on high achieving women, but the research now suggests it can impact anybody, and tends to get worse at key moments, such as shifting from being a student to newly qualified or to a new role, she said.
“That’s when it kicks in for a lot of people, but some people feel it most of the time.”
As well as being distressing and stressful at a personal level, having imposter thoughts can have negative effects professionally: some may become perfectionists, or people pleasing, to the detriment of their own health and wellbeing; they may self-sabotage, not applying for jobs or promotions; or they may become micro-managers who are hard to work with.
Harrison offered some strategies to address imposter thinking and underscored the importance when talking about advanced practice, saying that professional stream in the UK is not just about being an expert clinical practitioner, but about “being holistic in terms of research, education, audit and being a good leader, so you need the confidence to bring people with you.”
Also, follow @UltrasoundPG on X/Twitter to see her fantastic photography, including from ASMIRT2024.
Watch this interview with Professor Gill Harrison
4. Imaging children with cancer or violent injuries takes a big toll
Performing medical radiation scans on children who have cancer or have been injured through abuse or neglect can result in significant emotional toll for the paediatric medical imaging workforce, research has found.
Queensland Children’s Hospital paediatric radiographer Fiona Franklin presented at ASMIRT on her Master’s thesis which asked: Are any of the multidisciplinary members of this paediatric medical imaging department struggling with their mental health and wellbeing? If so, what can be done to help?
In 2021, Franklin invited 146 members of her department to participate in the research: 35 surveys were completed, a 24 percent response rate, and then analysed using the Jarden Me, We, Us Framework.
A resounding 80 percent of the survey respondents reported that they had observed an incidence where occupational wellbeing was affected by work, with ‘intense workload’ emerging from the data as one of the key themes.
That intensity takes many forms, her thesis says, but paediatric abuse and suffering was one of the main sub-themes, prompting comments such as:
- ‘Disturbing injuries to children can impact staff by being quite traumatic to see (eg non accidental injury cases)’
- ‘Distressing patient stories’
- ‘It can be very challenging and upsetting when imaging very young children with poor prognostic cancers’
- ‘Also patients who remind you of your children can be upsetting in terms of triggering if your child is affected by a similar illness/disability’.
Drawing on other research, Franklin said that non accidental injury is an area of paediatric imaging that can have psychological repercussions for radiographers due to the traumatic nature of the child’s injuries, the associated legal implications for the parents or carers, and the need to maintain professionalism and non-judgmental attitudes towards parents or carers.
Franklin put forward a number of recommendations for dealing with these pressures, including debriefs after traumatic or difficult work, acknowledgement by the workplace of the complexity and intensity of these issues, review of staffing levels, team workload and management expectations, involving staff in decisions, and having occupational wellbeing as a standing agenda item for team meetings.
She also put the case for supporting employee wellbeing is important, including that happier employees are healthier, have fewer sick days, are more productive, and stay in their jobs longer. By contrast, quality of patient care decreases when staff wellbeing decreased, she said.
Franklin highlighted this US study: ‘Walk in my shoes’: intradepartmental role shadowing to increase workplace collegiality and wellness in a large pediatric radiology department.
5. Neurodivergence is different, not less
Like so many healthcare settings, medical radiation environments are often fast-paced, stressful, noisy and with bright lights.
That can make them challenging for anyone working or learning in them, but particularly so for people who are neurodiverse, says radiation therapist Bernadette Byrne, a clinical educator with the Tasmanian Health Department’s Northern Cancer Service in Launceston.
Byrne delivered a workshop and presentation to #ASMIRT2024 on the need to look at how medical radiation sciences can provide a more supportive learning environment for students who live with neurodiverse conditions during clinical placement.
An estimated 15-20 percent of Australians are neurodiverse, meaning they have a brain that functions differently to what is considered “typical”, she said. Neurodiverse conditions include autism, dyslexia, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Yet, there is “scant research” in the medical radiation discipline about neurodiversity, despite it having been defined as a concept for 30 years now, she said. A UK publication last year asked: How can we support those we know nothing about? Leading on and advocating for more research to support neurodivergent student radiographers in the UK.
Byrne told the conference she came to the issue with lived experience: after a difficult diagnostic journey, both she and her son had been diagnosed with ADHD.
Medication has been “life altering”, but “pills don’t teach skills” and she has put in place many arrangements, including reminders and alarms, to help manage the condition.
It got her thinking about how many of her radiography students, and others elsewhere, have been managing it, diagnosed and undiagnosed, while on clinical placement.
Byrne said medical radiation professionals require a distinct skillset, combining physics, anatomy, physiology, patient care and communication, with ever increasing demands of technological skills.
Awareness of neurodiversity is growing but, in the medical radiation sciences, “is not something we address as part of diversity and inclusion programs”.
“Particularly in our hospitals and clinical centres…it’s busy, everyone is running a million miles an hour, and the impact that can have on a neurodiverse individual, whether patient student or worker, is quite significant,” she later told Croakey.
Stigma and exclusion meant that students would be likely reluctant to ask clinical supervisors, who may well be potential employers, for learning and assessment accommodations.
So the prerogative must be on the profession to understand that “all our learners, neurodivergent or not, have different needs for their placement experiences to be successful and fulfilling”.
Meeting those needs for neurodivergent students, she said, requires looking at how to apply neuro supporting practice, along with universal design for learning to work spaces, looking at a range of factors from adjustable lighting and acoustic settings to providing different methods of written and visual communication.
Watch this interview with Bernadette Byrne
Also presenting at the workshop session was Byrne’s colleague Katie Scott, who discussed gender diversity in medical radiation practice, recommending these two sites: https://www.seattlechildrens.org/healthcare-professionals/provider-news/gender-inclusivity-toolkit/ and https://www.transhub.org.au/#
Also readers might be interested in this video on ADHD in the workplace.
See this X/Twitter summary from the workshop.
6. The keys to a thriving career, workplace and profession
Dr Caroline Wright was this year’s ASMIRT winner of the Varian Award, honouring high achievement in radiation therapy through recognising significant contributions to the profession, patient care, and ASMIRT.
Titled ‘Beyond survival’, her address at #ASMIRT2024 looked at how to establish a thriving (versus just surviving) career, workplace and profession.
Much of the medical radiation sciences’ focus to date had been on patient care, she said, but it was time also to turn the mirror on the profession too.
Also reflecting on self-care and echoing other presentations, Wright admitted it had only been in recent months, after decades in the profession, that she had felt like she was thriving — her self-diagnosis on what had prevented that earlier was that she’d had her fingers in too many pies.
It has only been recently that she has felt able to relinquish certain roles that had previously defined her professionally, without thinking she was a ‘failure’ because she couldn’t manage everything.
“Saying yes to everything is fantastic … but it’s not always the best thing for you,” she said.
Wright mapped out the recent evolution of the profession, including important shifts from cultural ‘competence’ through to ‘safety’ and on to ‘humility’, the growing role of artificial intelligence, and growing awareness of global issues that impact on the profession, including climate change.
7. Snapshots from other presentations
Resilience and perseverance – how to balance being a radiographer and a researcher — and some tips for students.
See this summary on X/Twitter.
See this summary on X/Twitter.
See this summary on X/Twitter.
Does simulation training adequately prepare us for CPR in the real world?
And that’s a wrap!
See this summary on X/Twitter from the closing ceremony.
Watch this video interview with #ASMIRT2024’s Northern Territory co-convenors Kim Haywood and Bec Kilday. 
Bookmark this link for Croakey Conference News Service coverage of #ASMIRT2024, and stay tuned for our forthcoming e-publication compiling all the coverage.
We thank everyone who contributed to our coverage, through presentations, interviews, photos, social media posts and other support.
