Juang, Titania

Abstract Clinical medical physics is a profession that intersects with various groups as part of a broader healthcare team, including dosimetrists, radiation therapists, radiologic and MRI technologists, IT specialists, and physicians. Success in this field requires academic and technical excellence as well as comprehensive skills for working effectively within an interdisciplinary healthcare team. When hiring medical physics residents, the selection of well‐rounded and highly qualified candidates can be facilitated through a holistic review process that ensures consideration of traditional metrics such as academic performance while also accounting for the importance of various experiences, personal attributes, and intrinsic motivations that impact clinical performance and patient care. The Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) emphasizes an overall consideration of Experiences, Attributes, Competencies, and Metrics (EACM) as important for the search process. As part of the healthcare community, medical physics shares the same commitment to high‐quality patient care. By adopting the AAMC's EACM framework, medical physics residency programs can strengthen the fairness, rigor, and overall effectiveness of their application review processes—ultimately benefiting applicants, the medical physics community, and the patients we serve. This Society of Directors of Academic Medical Physics Programs (SDAMPP) task report aims to provide information and resources for applying holistic review to the applicant selection process for medical physics residency programs. Our objective is to enable program directors to reevaluate their selection methods in the context of institutional and program missions and goals and to improve the quality and specificity of recruitment by integrating holistic review concepts into their residency recruitment processes. This initiative can inspire change in recruitment practices, aid programs in hiring well‐rounded and well‐qualified residents, and support the professional growth of our trainees in healthcare. This report provides an overview of holistic reviews and its core principles. We review the current literature and provide evidence from successful implementations of holistic review in other medical fields to illustrate how it can benefit our field. Furthermore, we outline actionable recommendations to facilitate transitioning to a holistic review framework and address potential barriers with practical solutions. A supplemental workbook is provided to guide residency programs in developing their own holistic application review and interview processes. With this report, we aim to provide practical implementation guidelines that will allow residency program directors to implement a selection methodology that comprehensively assesses the full qualifications of individual candidates and ultimately fosters the development of versatile and competent clinical medical physicists who are best equipped to advance the field, meet patient needs, and improve patient care.

Abstract Cancer occurs in ∼1 per 1000 pregnancies; thousands of patients may require radiation procedures for diagnosis and treatment each year in the United States alone. This rare but high-risk scenario, coupled with fear of radiation, has created ambiguity in the ideal management of pregnant patients. Without a comprehensive guide for the use of radiation in imaging and treatment for pregnant cancer patients, it is difficult for providers to offer optimal patient-centered care without introducing disparities. The goal of this paper is to provide guidance on the use of radiation for screening, diagnosis, staging, and treatment of cancer, while highlighting gaps in existing knowledge and guidelines. The intention is that physicians, medical physicists, and patients could use this document as a resource for shared decision-making, ensuring safe and effective practice. A team of physicians and medical physicists with expertise in imaging, radiotherapy, and maternal fetal medicine was assembled, along with a patient advocate and lawyer. Existing guidelines and recent literature were reviewed. Authors also drew from their experience where published guidance was lacking. The resulting document discusses best practice to guide use of radiation for cancer, as well as patient-centered care management and legal considerations. Overall, it is possible to safely and effectively deliver radiation to pregnant patients in numerous circumstances. Use of radiation or other modalities should be discussed through shared decision-making with the physician and patient, contextualizing the maternal and fetal risk from treatments. Healthcare providers should support wide access to reproductive healthcare to allow equitable, evidence-based, patient-centered healthcare.