The success of members of our Medical Physics team at the South East Healthcare Science Awards last week was awarded.
Professor Ken Young (Head of NCCPM Research), received the Lifetime Achievement Award for physical sciences. Ken is internationally renowned as a leader in the field of mammography. Over the last 34 years, he has developed and supported the NCCPM service in providing scientific expertise to the national breast screening programme, sometimes taking controversial decisions to assure the quality and safety of breast imaging. He has been heavily involved in researching optimisation of mammography imaging, including the establishment of the OPTIMAM database, possibly the largest publically available image database which supports training and testing of AI systems, in collaboration with the Scientific Computing team. Ken retires next month, and I am delighted he has received this prestigious award in recognition of his outstanding career.
Alex Smout (Nuclear Medicine Physics) was awarded the Innovation Excellence Award for his boundless enthusiasm and imagination in problem-solving. He has introduced numerous developments to improve the quality, safety and efficiency of processes in nuclear medicine imaging and therapies, enhancing both the patient and staff experience.
The awards were presented by Professor Dame Sue Hill, Chief Scientific Officer for England at an award ceremony on 20th March.
Other nominees from our team were: Mel Cunningham (Educational Leadership Award), Suzanne Osgood (Emerging Talent Award), Rachel Hollingdale/Matt Bolt (Innovation Excellence Award) and the Surface-Guided Radiotherapy commissioning Team (Patient Impact Award).
Congratulations to the teams!