Preparedness is essential to a successful career in imaging sciences. Understanding and correctly utilizing advanced imaging equipment can provide medical professionals an inside look at the human body, giving them a better chance of successfully diagnosing and treating the patient.
And for generations of graduates of Avila’s Imaging Science program, they’ve been prepared for anything the moment they leave campus.
“I was always very impressed with all of our teachers, their passion and their sincere desire to have us graduate well-prepared for what we’d be facing in the field,” said Amy Alexander ’93. “I knew what I needed to know when I started, day one. The hospital that hired me was where I had done my clinical training, so I knew the equipment, the location—I knew everything. I was ready to hit the ground running.”
Celebrating its 40th anniversary, the program was the first—and remains the only—four-year baccalaureate program in Kansas City and has been preparing students for vital work since its founding.
“Our program is set up so that our graduates are 100 percent prepared, and employers seek out our graduates because they know that Avila graduates will be ready to go,” said Sarah Sanford ’08, Avila Radiological Science Department Chair. “When I started at North Kansas City Hospital after graduation, I can say confidently I was 100 percent prepared. There wasn’t anything I had to learn on the ground.”
Since its founding, Avila Imaging Science has been producing highly skilled technologists in many modalities, like CT, MRI, and others for the Kansas City community. While the University offered undergraduate degrees in the field prior to 1980, students in the program needed to have completed training prior to enrolling in order to enter. By creating the four-year degree program, Avila’s program began to appeal to a broader range of students, like Dunrie Lewis ’86.
“I completed a two-year radiology program at Bethany Medical Center after high school, which was how you got into the field at that time,” Lewis said. “After completing another one-year program at St. Luke’s (Hospital) to become a radiation therapy technologist, I was intrigued about attending a four-year institution, and the program at Avila came to my attention. “My professors understood I had experience in the field, and I was able to test out of some of the anatomy, physiology and medical terminology. But my professors helped me a lot, and were just very, very nice in addition. I had a goal to head up the radiation therapy that Bethany was introducing, and my teachers helped me get there.”
Tackling an undergraduate degree while also working in the field meant Lewis sometimes worked from 7 a.m. when her shift began into the late hours of the night, while she finished up coursework. A love of learning and a clear objective helped her overcome the challenges she faced.
“The long days never seemed like that big of a deal because I always had the goal of heading up the department in the back of my mind,” she said. “Both my husband and I were in school at the same time, we hadn’t had kids yet and we both like to learn—it just seemed like the thing to do.”
The service-oriented profession proved attractive to many students in the program. Luke Josephine ’13—a physician’s assistant with North Kansas City Hospital’s emergency care unit—said that core value led him to pursue a career in imaging science, and he still draws inspiration from the values instilled into him during his time at Avila.
“The biggest thing for me is just servitude, that feeling like you’ve helped someone,” Alexander said. “I think the point of my life is to make a difference in improving someone’s life and imaging sciences has helped me achieve that many times over. (That emphasis) is what I liked so much about Avila and the program.”
That value of service has been an intrinsic part of the program, according to Sanford.
“I might be biased coming from this program, but I really believe in the mission and values of the University and CSJ and try to encourage that in future students,” she said. “When we’re working with patients, we strive to treat them with dignity in what can sometimes be an uncomfortable or painful time. We try to show our students the power of our mission, and hopefully help develop the whole person.”
The connections with hospitals in Kansas City—including St. Joseph’s Medical Center, Centerpoint Medical Center, North Kansas City Hospital, and others—ultimately evolved into formal affiliations. Ultimately, many graduates from the program lined up their first position thanks to the clinical work they complete in their final year.
“Generally, in the industry, you do your clinical and then typically find a fulltime position afterward,” Sanford said. “Avila is unique in that we use a primary site model—our students train for two years primarily at one facility. At that point it comes down to your job interview and whether they want to hire you.
“Now, if you walk into one of our radiology affiliates, you would find that 75 to 80 percent of the technologists working there are Avila alumni. On top of that, we look at the employment statistics for our graduating classes in five-year batches for accreditation purposes. We’re at 100 percent employment for our most recent report.”
That standard of excellence means Avila graduates are highly sought after. Alexander, who is now Radiology Operations Manager for AdventHealth Shawnee Mission, said an applicant’s school plays a major role in the hiring process.
“I definitely look at the school (an applicant) attended and where they did their clinicals,” she said. “It makes a big difference if they were in a large hospital or small clinic. I want someone who likes to be busy and has experience with a large number of patients. You can get a feel for that, like if they tell me they had 10 patients a day, I tell them ‘Well here you’re going to be seeing closer to 50.’
“Avila prepared me for that, and the other radiology graduates I’ve seen come through the program—including a fellow alum that I work side-by-side with—are well-prepared as soon as they step foot in our hospital.”
As imaging equipment and technology advance, practitioners must continue to learn new skills and techniques in order to keep abreast of current trends. Sanford said that reality presents the biggest challenge the department will face moving forward—ensuring the quality of resources matches the quality of students.
“Our profession will always be anatomy-based and many of the changes we see are normal—new diseases or new trends in medical thinking, for instance,” she said. “As a profession, we have to be forward thinking and be ready to train students for new technologies. Because they’re using older equipment, our students are perhaps more prepared because they’ve been trained on older equipment that requires a more basic understanding of the underlying principles.”
As the first, and still only, four-year baccalaureate program in Kansas City, Avila continues to hold a sizable advantage over other programs in the region. However, the program will need to make significant investments in equipment upgrades to maintain its strong reputation and caliber of instruction. According to Sanford, improving current student resources will be pivotal to the continued success of the program.
“We have been able to maintain a high level of excellence despite some of limitations we face,” she said. “But after 40 successful years, we are excited to grow and strengthen the program as we move forward into the future.”