It has been ten years since the Universidad de La Frontera started the formal activities of its Master´s Program in Medical Physics, which is the first one in this field in Chile.

As a pioneer in the training of medical physicists in research and the clinical field, the UFRO was able to consolidate a work group that has gone beyond the borders of our region and country, promoting research that promotes the application of physics in the medical field in order to prevent, diagnose and treat diseases.

In a ceremony that brought university authorities, academic staff, students and graduates together, the Program director, Dr. Marcia García, showed a presentation about what marked the development of this Master´s Program the most and which achievements have consolidated this idea that goes back to 2005.

This is how a committed group of the Department of Physical Sciences of the UFRO Faculty of Engineering and Science with the backup of the Faculty of Medicine achieved to create a Program that recently has been reaccredited for a period of five years.

MANAGEMENT

The search of excellence implied the signature of four international collaboration agreements and other five with institutions and centers in Chile, apart from other bilateral links with research groups with which an important collaboration could be established related to the clinical and professional training of the students and in the field of scientific and technological development, through the participation in different research projects and getting several projects awarded.

More than 60 scientific publications and more that 100 participations in congresses in Chile and abroad are part of the work that has been done within the Master´s Program. This also includes the organization of events, such as the Medical Physics Day at La Frontera, which will be in its sixth version this year, from November 4th to 6th, 2018, in Pucón, Chile.

Other things that marked this Program since its start are the creation of the UFRO Center of Medical Physics and Engineering (CFIM) in 2016, where physicists, engineers and other professionals bring their knowledge together for the development of innovative solutions of high impact in the field of medicine in our region, the country and abroad, and the active participation of academic staff and graduates of the Program in the constitution of the Medical Physics Society in Chile (SOFIMECH) in 2014.

It is also important to say that 27 students graduated from the Program since its beginning, among them Mg. José Velásquez, who entered the Program just after finishing his Bachelor´s Degree in Computer Engineering, and who graduated from it in 2013. “I always wanted to go beyond the field of engineering. This is why I wanted to keep studying in a postgraduate Program in applied engineering or physics, just when this Master´s Program started – a Program that opened a lot of doors for me and changed my professional career plan”, said the professional who works at the Institute of Clinical Oncology in Temuco and in University teaching.

Since this anniversary has been celebrated at the beginning of the academic year, the Master in Medical Physics also presented the student cohort 2018, which consists of six professionals. Fabiola Avello, a medical technologist at the Regional Hospital of Concepción, Chile, is one of them. About this new academic experience she said that she needed more tools as a professional for being able to develop herself, and the UFRO Program seemed very attractive for her, because it gave her everything she wanted to find in one single place and that helps her to move forward in the professional area.

With the start of the academic year and the commitment to keep being a leader in the training of medical physicists at the national and international level, this Master´s Program is already visualizing future challenges: the creation of a doctoral program in medical physics and the recognition of this discipline as a research field of physics by the National Commission for Scientific and Technological Research (CONICYT).