Representatives of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) public health authorities discussed the progress towards initiating a structured and supervised clinical training programme in medical physics in Asia and the Pacific (ARASIA) region.
A third coordination meeting under the technical cooperation regional project ‘Upgrading Medical Physics Services in ARASIA State Parties through Education and Training’ was held by IAEA Technical Cooperation (TC) Department from 5 to 9 March 2012, Vienna, Austria.
Participating with over 20 healthcare experts from 9 Arab States, the UAE officials from the Dubai Hospital, and Dubai Department of Health and Medical Services (DOHMS) contributed to the status report on progress achieved under the project. The report identified regional and national training needs for the implementation of national clinical training programmes. The meeting also planned the further work for the conduct of the regional clinical training programmes.
The application of radiation in human health, for both diagnosis and treatment of disease, is an important component of the technical cooperation work between the IAEA and the Member States. The radiation medicine is to a greater extent dependant on well-trained medical physicists.
Accordingly, the lack of qualified and capable professionals significantly limits medical physics support for the healthcare sector in the ARASIA region.
