AAHP/ABHP Blog Posts

In modern medicine, ionizing radiation plays a crucial role in diagnosing and treating various medical conditions.

However, exposure to this powerful energy can also pose potential health risks, and research shows that patient-related stress can negatively impact radiation therapy outcomes.

That's why it is so important to have experts who understand the science behind ionizing radiation and how to minimize its harmful effects.

As fears of an accident at Europe's largest nuclear power plant grow, EU authorities have recently taken extraordinary steps to help protect Ukrainians living near the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia facility.

They’ve distributed more than five million potassium iodide (KI) tablets, commonly called anti-radiation pills.

And they’re not the only ones doing it.

When Ian Lake saw what it took to become a certified health physicist (CHP), he felt what most feel upon first glance: overwhelmed.

“I was intimidated,” said Lake, an associate medical physicist at Beaumont Heath in Royal Oak, Michigan. “The academic requirements, the years of required work experience, a two-part exam, a written report, the references—it’s a lot.”

“You should become a CHP (certified health physicist).”

That’s what Ian Lake, now an associate medical physicist at Beaumont Heath in Royal Oak, Michigan, was told by a colleague at an industry conference when he was just 22.

He initially filed the thought away. Then, after some consideration, he took the recommendation to heart and moved fast to become a CHP.

I’m pregnant. I just had a pelvic X-ray. Should I be concerned?                                                                

The inquiry was sent recently from a reader in Italy to Emily Caffrey, a Certified Health Physicist (CHP) and the chief editor of “Ask the Experts,” an educational website at the Health Physics Society (HPS).

Many parts of a recent five-part miniseries on HBO about the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster got under Dan Sowers’ skin.

None more than watching the skin melt off the body of a victim exposed to radiation.

“This is not quite what we would expect to see,” Sowers says.

He would know.

Was it an “act of war” or “mass hysteria?”

That’s how a recent headline from The New York Times read about a controversial series of events dating back nearly six years.

Did enormous quantities of targeted radiation make American diplomats sick?

Keith Strauss, an emeritus associate professor at the University of Cincinnati School of Medicine, is fully aware of what his well-researched proclamation means for his line of work, all medical technologists, millions of patients, decades of clinical best practices and countless textbooks, exams and course curriculums.

Everything needs to change.