Shownotes
This episode dives deep into the fascinating world of radiology informatics with guest Amina Alahi, who shares her unexpected journey from X-ray technologist to imaging informatics applications manager at Penn Medicine. Amina emphasizes the growing importance of artificial intelligence in the field and how radiologic technologists can transition into informatics roles without needing additional formal education. Listeners will discover valuable insights about the skills required for informatics, the significance of mentorship, and the power of networking within the medical imaging community. Amina's story highlights the diverse opportunities available for radiology professionals looking to evolve their careers beyond traditional patient care roles. Tune in for a lively discussion filled with practical advice and a fresh perspective on the future of medical imaging.
Imaging Informatics: Radiology Technologist Can Learn AI
Welcome to A Couple of Rad Techs Podcast, where we explore the world of medical imaging and informatics. In this episode, our host, Chaundria Singleton, chats with Ameena Elahi, an imaging informatics and application manager at Penn Medicine. Ameena shares her journey from starting as an X-ray technologist to transitioning to information services and how she accidentally got into informatics. They delve into the challenges and triumphs of navigating a career in imaging informatics, as well as the evolving role of technology in the field. The conversation sheds light on the day-to-day responsibilities in imaging informatics, the importance of communication and organization in running projects, and the value of mentorship and continued education for professionals in this rapidly advancing field. As Ameena shares her experiences and insights, listeners can gain valuable knowledge about the transition from clinical roles to informatics, the future of informatics with AI, and the significance of mentorship and sponsorship in career growth. So, join us as we uncover the world of imaging informatics and gain valuable insights from Ameena Elahi's expertise and journey.
Connect with Ameena
Email: ameenaelahi.ae@gmail.com
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Chaundria Singleton introduces the episode with Amina Alahi, an imaging informatics and applications manager at Penn Medicine, emphasizing the importance of radiology informatics in today's medical landscape. The discussion delves into Amina's unique journey from being an x-ray technologist to her current role, highlighting her extensive experience and academic background, including degrees in health administration and public administration. Amina shares her insights on the significance of understanding workflows and efficiency in medical imaging, especially as artificial intelligence starts to play a larger role in the field. Chandria and Amina explore how imaging informatics can improve patient care by streamlining processes and enhancing the accessibility of medical images for clinicians. This episode not only sheds light on the technical aspects of informatics but also addresses the human side of the transition from patient care to informatics roles, encouraging listeners to consider how their skills as technologists can be leveraged in this growing field.
Takeaways:
- The transition from radiology technologist to informatics can be a rewarding career move for many.
- Networking and mentorship are essential for career growth in the field of medical imaging.
- Investing in continuing education can significantly enhance your skills and career opportunities.
- Artificial intelligence is becoming increasingly important in radiology and informatics, shaping future workflows.
- Understanding the tools and systems in informatics is crucial for improving patient care.
- Self-education and seeking out certifications can help bridge the gap into informatics roles.
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Transcripts
Welcome, everyone, to a couple of Rad techs podcasts.
Chandria Singleton:I'm Chandria Singleton, and we have an amazing episode in store for you today.
Chandria Singleton:Before I get into our episode, I do want to thank our sponsors, magic mind.
Chandria Singleton:We're going to talk more about it a little further into our episode, but thank you, magic mind, for sponsoring this episode.
Chandria Singleton:We have Amina Alahi, and we're going to talk radiology informatics today.
Chandria Singleton:I'm just going to give you a brief overview of her bio because I want to jump right into this episode.
Chandria Singleton:You are listening.
Chandria Singleton:If you're watching us, please, please, please take your pen and paper out.
Chandria Singleton:Make mental notes.
Chandria Singleton:She's an imaging informatics and applications manager at Penn Medicine.
Chandria Singleton:She's responsible for project oversight for image applications, including research and artificial intelligence.
Chandria Singleton:Yes.
Chandria Singleton:AI.
Chandria Singleton: r as an x ray technologist in: Chandria Singleton:You guys, if you listen to me, you know, I'm always telling people when they want to know, should they go to school for x ray or just straight to another modality?
Chandria Singleton:I always encourage start at the top of the umbrella and everything else will trickle down for you.
Chandria Singleton:Amina's transition from x ray technologies to information services.
Chandria Singleton:She has a b's in health administration from Drexel, a master's in public administration from Keller, and she's currently enrolled in the University of Pennsylvania's organization dynamics master's program.
Chandria Singleton:Yes.
Chandria Singleton:I bring the best to you guys.
Chandria Singleton:Welcome, Amina.
Amina Alahi:Thank you.
Amina Alahi:Thank you so much for having me.
Amina Alahi:I'm excited to be here.
Chandria Singleton:We are excited to have you.
Chandria Singleton:We're going to have a conversation.
Chandria Singleton:This is not scripted, you guys.
Chandria Singleton:We have not talked ahead of time, but I know I have a lot of questions about informatics.
Chandria Singleton:As an introduction, I gave a brief bio.
Chandria Singleton:But tell us a little bit about how you started in medical imaging radiology before you went over to informatics.
Amina Alahi:Very similar informatics.
Amina Alahi:It was kind of an accident, a very happy accident.
Amina Alahi:I was a business major in undergrad, and I just decided I actually don't want to do this or what will I be doing when I finish?
Amina Alahi:And I ran across what still my best friend right now, Stephanie Barnes, who was telling me about her major.
Amina Alahi:And I looked it up and I was like, medical imaging?
Amina Alahi:I honestly had no idea what it was.
Amina Alahi:I still enrolled and I thought I was going to be doing baby ultrasounds like many people do coming in.
Amina Alahi:Right.
Amina Alahi:I did not move past my rotation and ultrasounds, only one of that.
Amina Alahi:I've been at the University of Penn a Penn medicine for just over 20 years now, which is unbelievable.
Amina Alahi:But I started off overnights in bone chests, you know, portables or eR, trauma, and then I spent the next five and a half years in IR.
Amina Alahi:Following that I was a coordinator and I learned so much from every position, but I'm also someone who's easily bored.
Amina Alahi: eally do something, you know,: Amina Alahi:But I still loved being a tech and I will keep my license up until I'm 95.
Amina Alahi:If the way I got into informatics, it was honestly luck.
Amina Alahi:Yes, I'm a hard worker, but I was working on a project as a coordinator where I was working on the front end of our image exchange application and working with it to help improve it.
Amina Alahi:And we got a conversation going once or twice and he basically, he's still my boss, was like, you should apply to this position.
Amina Alahi:And I turned it down.
Amina Alahi:Oh, wow, multiple times.
Chandria Singleton:Wait, why did you turn it down?
Amina Alahi:So when I was telling you before that I'm easily bored, I'm always been interested in a lot of things.
Amina Alahi:I thought I would stay at tech, but I thought I would be in different avenues.
Amina Alahi:I was never a super technical person, you know, last to get a smartphone, I was considering going back to school for chemistry.
Amina Alahi:Can I find another coordinator position which I was applying to?
Amina Alahi:And although they weren't patient facing, they always had nursing preferred and I couldn't get an interview, but I finished my masters and masters wasn't even required.
Amina Alahi:I just couldn't get an interview when I was asking him a question about if he had a project management background because I really enjoyed the way we worked together.
Amina Alahi:And he actually did.
Amina Alahi:And then he actually saw an excel for Dummies book on my desk.
Amina Alahi:And he's like, is that yours?
Amina Alahi:And I was like a little embarrassed.
Amina Alahi:I was like, yeah.
Amina Alahi:He's like, well, why'd you get it?
Amina Alahi:I was like, I just wanted to learn it.
Amina Alahi:Outside of some basic things, I never really used excel.
Amina Alahi:So I'm someone who's always like, self educating and doing continuing education as well as formal.
Amina Alahi:To answer your question, long story short, of all the jobs I was considering in past, I did not consider anything technical because I am not by nature a technical person.
Amina Alahi:But he further explained to me, he was like, well, just tell me more about what you want to do.
Amina Alahi:I was like, in short, I want to get behind the problem to prevent it from starting, right?
Amina Alahi:I want to work on things to help make them more efficient.
Amina Alahi:And he was like, I am telling you right now, this is exactly where you want to be.
Amina Alahi:You will get to do this and so much more.
Amina Alahi:And I'm so happy.
Amina Alahi:I eventually said yes, the same way I'm happy.
Amina Alahi:I just almost randomly became attacked because it's been a game changer.
Chandria Singleton:I agree.
Chandria Singleton:I didn't know what it was either.
Chandria Singleton:And it's so funny because I had had exams all of my life.
Chandria Singleton:I had gut issues, and I've had a lot of the fluoroscopy exams, and I didn't know they were radiologic technologists.
Chandria Singleton:I just assumed they were nurses.
Chandria Singleton:I'll be honest with you, my parents didn't know, and my uncle became a rad tech, and I just knew he had this great schedule.
Chandria Singleton:Him and his wife had a great lifestyle.
Chandria Singleton:And becoming older, he was like, I think you should go to school for radiology.
Chandria Singleton:I didn't really know what it was, and that is why I do this podcast and have great guests on like you, because a lot of people send me messages asking, I'm getting older in the field of radiology.
Chandria Singleton:My body can't do more.
Chandria Singleton:I want to kind of transition out of patient care.
Chandria Singleton:I want to leave this for the younger people, or the younger people may be coming out of radiology school and say, I want to learn this AI.
Chandria Singleton:Tell us a little more.
Chandria Singleton:How did it transition from there?
Amina Alahi:It wasn't like I applied, and then two weeks I was into the open position.
Amina Alahi:They were creating a new team.
Amina Alahi:It took a few months.
Amina Alahi:It wasn't a full year, you know, transitioning in.
Amina Alahi:He told me about a certification.
Amina Alahi:The CIIP is a certification for imaging informatics professionals, which is under Ebye, which is under art.
Amina Alahi:And that was a way for me to get more familiar.
Amina Alahi:But I will tell you, there was no formal training, right.
Amina Alahi:Typically, if you're not on the PACS team, and at the time, you will get formal PACs training, they might even send you away, or if you're not on the EMR team, they're sending you away, and you could get certified.
Amina Alahi:There's really no one training you.
Amina Alahi:So I had to learn.
Amina Alahi:I'm gonna be very clear.
Amina Alahi:I did not do it all on my own.
Amina Alahi:I had to figure out a lot of it on my own.
Amina Alahi:So it was stressful in the beginning.
Amina Alahi:About the first year, year and a half, I was like, did I make the wrong decision?
Amina Alahi:And I had a lot of anxiety about it.
Amina Alahi:It wasn't until we got a new PaC system, and I was starting with other people on different teams at the same level, and I was like, oh, I'm okay.
Amina Alahi:And then a little later I was like, oh, actually was doing better than I thought I was in the beginning, but I would never want anyone to have that kind of stress.
Amina Alahi:So everyone coming in after me, especially if they have a tech background, I try to make it easier for them and then I hope that next person makes it even easier for the next person to transition.
Amina Alahi:Kind of a lot of what you're saying.
Amina Alahi:I've had so many people reach out to me like, you know, what's been 20 years, or you even less, and like, my back's killing me.
Amina Alahi:All the things, right?
Amina Alahi:How do I get in?
Amina Alahi:Or I'm ready to try something new, as well as people still in school who are like, oh, that's what I would actually like to do.
Amina Alahi:I love spreading the word.
Amina Alahi:It's an amazing career.
Amina Alahi:It's so diverse.
Amina Alahi:There is no one specific thing.
Amina Alahi:You can be in projects, having texts in this field, being able to navigate between clinical and it is a plus.
Amina Alahi:And it's just really been good to me.
Chandria Singleton:Yeah, I could tell.
Chandria Singleton:It's a few things you said I want to unpack because I have the same vision.
Chandria Singleton:I know how hard it was when I tried to move over into MRI.
Chandria Singleton:There were no schools out there and people weren't as readily happy to train you.
Chandria Singleton:Some people feel like you should stay over there.
Chandria Singleton:And it was hard for me.
Chandria Singleton:The path that I wouldn't get into MRI, I would never wish that on my worst enemy.
Chandria Singleton:My goal, like yours, is I want to be encouraging and help people where I can to move where they want to be and do it in a way where it does not have to stress people out and make it difficult for people.
Chandria Singleton:Because this field has over eleven modalities and when I started there were only maybe five or six.
Chandria Singleton:Now it's eleven and growing, so there's opportunity for everyone.
Chandria Singleton:And some may be listening and say, I understand the anxiety Amina was talking about, especially texts that have been in the game for a while.
Chandria Singleton:You have flashbacks out of how you were treated in x ray school.
Chandria Singleton:It's like, I don't want to go through that again.
Chandria Singleton:I don't feel like being a student again.
Chandria Singleton:I don't have the life in me to go back to schools because that's very relatable.
Chandria Singleton:And I feel like you have so much that a lot of people are going to want to reach out to you and learn about this.
Chandria Singleton:Informatics.
Chandria Singleton:So for someone listening, what is informatics?
Chandria Singleton:What is like a day in the life of an informatics technologist?
Amina Alahi:Informatics is very broad.
Amina Alahi:Imaging informatics narrows it a little bit.
Amina Alahi:The basics that I could say is it's everything to do with making sure clinicians can easily see an image that goes with the storing of the studies, pulling studies from the archive, all the tools associated, you know, on the system.
Amina Alahi:And it's not just Pax.
Amina Alahi:While PAX is one of our most powerful systems in the game, at a facility, we have over 80 systems that our clinical imaging group supports.
Amina Alahi:And as you mentioned earlier, over the past few years, we've really been blowing up in artificial intelligence a day in the life.
Amina Alahi:When I started as an analyst and for my teammates, everyone's responsible for at least one application as their primary.
Amina Alahi:First thing you do when you log in, you make sure the application is up and running.
Amina Alahi:There's no issues with slowness.
Amina Alahi:You may want to check on how many users are logged on.
Amina Alahi:You generally like to have an idea of what the peak performance is so you can get ahead of potential issues because of that peak performance.
Amina Alahi:And you have projects, the medical imaging management word projects team.
Amina Alahi:So we do support some main applications, including our Venoneutra archive, which is also very powerful.
Amina Alahi:But outside of projects for those specific applications, we have other projects with anything related to imaging.
Amina Alahi:We have two support teams, clinical imaging support team CIST, formerly known as the PaX team.
Amina Alahi:Right.
Amina Alahi:Their support and their more boots on the ground.
Amina Alahi:Although since the pandemic, a lot of them are also remote.
Amina Alahi:Right.
Amina Alahi:They'll just rotate the schedule and get to work home up to like four days a week, which is really nice, and do the support on the back end from home.
Amina Alahi:And that support can look anything like going into the settings and changing how the information looks.
Amina Alahi:It could be building display protocols, it could be figuring out why somebody's computer isn't launching well, that gives a good.
Chandria Singleton:Idea, because as someone like me, who all I know is like, the basic packs that I have when they first started rolling packs out years ago, we did everything by film and developer.
Chandria Singleton:And once the digital age started coming in, it was new for us.
Chandria Singleton:And then you got a Pax team.
Chandria Singleton:In our mind, a lot of times, it's most technologists out there, we only think about what we see, and that is the Pacs teams coming around, or we calling them to unlink something.
Chandria Singleton:It's even further than that.
Chandria Singleton:Now, when you talk about projects, give us an idea.
Chandria Singleton:Because when I think of analyst, my mind goes hard for me to be an analyst.
Chandria Singleton:I'm like, oh, my goodness, I don't think I could do that.
Chandria Singleton:But explain to us regular text out there.
Chandria Singleton:What is a job, say, one of your projects that you might do?
Chandria Singleton:What's some of the things that you have to deal with on one of those projects that we can relate to?
Amina Alahi:The title of analyst is also a very broad title.
Amina Alahi:We have hundreds within my department.
Amina Alahi:We have about 27 in my group right now.
Amina Alahi:So if you're running a project again, it varies.
Amina Alahi:We have some projects that take a couple years, some projects that are a matter of months.
Amina Alahi:Let's take a project where the analyst is in charge of all the project coordination.
Amina Alahi:One of the projects could be an update to one of the systems.
Amina Alahi:Now, sometimes updates are largely put on what the vendor has to do, but there are other things that has to be done on our side.
Amina Alahi:Testing.
Amina Alahi:Right.
Amina Alahi:You need to make sure that all the tools, even the most basic ones, are working.
Amina Alahi:You need to make sure that your test environment mirrors your production environment.
Amina Alahi:And you need to go around and get feedback from the end users.
Amina Alahi:And typically you would identify a clinical champion, a tech and clinician, and someone in leadership on that side to help create buy in for what's to come.
Amina Alahi:So the upgrade, the complete change of a system, or just installing a net new system that we haven't seen before, and running projects besides communicating with people, organization, making sure that the team is frequently updated, whether it's once a week, making sure people get notes after meetings.
Amina Alahi:I think one of the hardest things that I have seen when people transition from clinical roles to informatics is running the meetings and worrying about how technical they have to be.
Amina Alahi:There are configurations, but I will tell you, it's not that hard.
Amina Alahi:Now, I want to be clear.
Amina Alahi:It's easy for me to say now, I've been doing this for over eight years, but there are many configurations where there are simple steps you have to do.
Amina Alahi:It doesn't mean everything's going to go perfectly.
Amina Alahi:And once you know how to troubleshoot those steps, just like you have to get creative when you're x ray, in certain patients, it really does translate.
Amina Alahi:And I love that clinical people can let, the more technical people can let them know why something is a priority and help triage.
Amina Alahi:Yeah, a little bit of everything, but a lot of it's.
Amina Alahi:Running the projects again, is about the communication, it's about the documentation, training if necessary, and creating buy in.
Chandria Singleton:Thank you for opening our eyes to what imaging informatics does.
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Chandria Singleton:Okay, so now we've talked about what is an informatics technologist?
Chandria Singleton:What kind of education is required?
Amina Alahi:Aminaheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheheh absolutely no additional education.
Amina Alahi:So while going to school and studying informatics will make you more marketable, I'm telling you as a hiring manager, we are looking first for people with experience.
Amina Alahi:But you always run into that issue of, well, how do I get the experience if no one will give me the experience?
Amina Alahi:When people reach out to me about how to get into the field, I tell them a few things.
Amina Alahi:You can look into that CIP certification that I was mentioning earlier, as well as getting involved with the society of imaging Informatics and Medicine sim.
Amina Alahi:But ask for stretch projects.
Amina Alahi:Reach out to your informatics team and ask them what are they looking for specifically.
Amina Alahi:We can't have a team, all of non super technical people.
Amina Alahi:We like to have a pretty diverse team and background, people who are coding, people who know networking, people who can run projects.
Amina Alahi:It doesn't mean to say that a tech who's not technical cannot become super technical and cannot be a coder or developer.
Amina Alahi:I work with some of the top people in the industry, and some of them people don't have degrees and some have degrees in things like psychology, but they were self taught.
Amina Alahi:There are a lot of free things you can find out there.
Amina Alahi:Honestly, you will likely go to a YouTube rabbit hole trying to identify how to get there because there isn't a lot of information specifically on imaging informatics.
Amina Alahi:So really finding someone who's willing to mentor you through that process and identify things that you could work on, find out what your institution is looking for.
Chandria Singleton:Those are good, because my question was going to be next about skills needed.
Chandria Singleton:You just helped us to appreciate things that someone without a technical background but has the experience as a technologist, which is very valuable in informatics.
Chandria Singleton:I love how you're helping us as technologists to see because I think a lot of times we forget that we do have a vital role.
Chandria Singleton:We're the third largest medical profession in the world for a reason, and you've been doing this for over 20 years.
Chandria Singleton:You have the experience, you've done x ray, you've done interventional.
Chandria Singleton:Many technologists out there have a lot of skills that they just have not realized and been mentored enough to do that.
Chandria Singleton:I want to talk a little bit about mentorship.
Chandria Singleton:We talked a little bit about that earlier and how my experience with x ray school and learning CT, I had a lot of mentorship.
Chandria Singleton:I was spoiled because I learned CT my second year in x ray school.
Chandria Singleton:It was actually the manager and lead technologist who really encouraged me to start my own business.
Chandria Singleton:When I got out of school, they really were encouraging and making sure I learned how to do iv placements, that I was like the best CT technologist and they made sure I got paid what I deserved.
Chandria Singleton:We talked money.
Chandria Singleton:They were like, this is what you go in there and ask for.
Chandria Singleton:Don't take less.
Chandria Singleton:They mentored me even when I didn't do well in scans, they were like, this is how you do it.
Chandria Singleton:They taught me.
Chandria Singleton:I don't know that we really have that because my mister experience was totally different.
Chandria Singleton:I was not mentored.
Chandria Singleton:It was not a very good experience.
Chandria Singleton:It was very anxious, one that I have learned that I would never want anybody else to go through.
Chandria Singleton:Tell us about mentorship and imaging informatics.
Chandria Singleton:Tell us about your mentorship because it sounds to me as you told your story, how you got into it, you had someone that believed in you, they saw it in you, even though you turned it down a few times.
Chandria Singleton:They were like a mentor.
Amina Alahi:A mentor and more specifically a sponsor.
Amina Alahi:From the beginning of my career, while I have people that I loved and may have helped me early on, just coming out of school, I was still scared of patients.
Amina Alahi:I had an amazing team who made me feel very comfortable in my environment and confidence in what they went to school for.
Amina Alahi:But as I went through different roles, you know, you get the good job, but no one's helping you advance, even when you ask the questions.
Amina Alahi:And I don't think it's always because people don't want to help.
Amina Alahi:I think people don't know how to help or they're like, well, you have a good job, but I want to do more.
Amina Alahi: So around the: Amina Alahi:But it was more along the lines of, I could have his job when he retires and like ten years.
Amina Alahi:He's a great mentor, right?
Amina Alahi:But he's even a better sponsor.
Amina Alahi:So a mentor is someone who guides you, and sometimes those relationships form naturally.
Amina Alahi:Other times you can actually ask for a mentor, maybe not say those specific words, but letting someone know that you are looking for guidance in your career path is so important.
Amina Alahi:I don't have this one mentor.
Amina Alahi:I have many mentors, and they do different things.
Amina Alahi:They serve different purposes.
Amina Alahi:I have clinicians as mentors, other informatics, people in administration from is and from clinical, and people outside of my organization that I've been able to collaborate with.
Amina Alahi:So when I have a question, like, I wanted to write my first paper, I was really nervous about it.
Amina Alahi:I didn't really know what I was doing.
Amina Alahi:Hadn't written a paper outside of school.
Amina Alahi:School.
Amina Alahi:The first person I asked, they were like, well, you know, it's going to be really hard.
Amina Alahi:And I was just like, thanks.
Amina Alahi:But my director was pretty encouraging, and she was like, hey, how about you ask these people?
Amina Alahi:And they jumped on it, so eager to help me.
Amina Alahi:One of those people was a mentor of mine who was in research, who used to be a tech, who also became very technical, an amazing SQL developer.
Amina Alahi:And they got me through it.
Amina Alahi:Like, I wrote the whole paper myself with them as co authors, and I had a lot of guidance, but who knows where I would have landed if it wasn't for their help.
Amina Alahi:I spoke about sponsors a little bit as well.
Amina Alahi:Sometimes people don't have the time to mentor you, and mentoring doesn't mean it has to be.
Amina Alahi:We meet every month on this Tuesday.
Amina Alahi:Some people are just better sponsors, right?
Amina Alahi:They'll put you up for things like, oh, you know what I see?
Amina Alahi:Amina wants to write papers now.
Amina Alahi:I never even considered text wanting to write papers and invite you to write more papers.
Amina Alahi:Same thing with my first talk.
Amina Alahi:So nervous.
Amina Alahi:I still get nervous now I have people who will reach out to me and say, hey, you know what?
Amina Alahi:I think you'll be great for this talk.
Amina Alahi:And it's just been things like that that have really changed the game for me.
Amina Alahi:I didn't know how much I needed mentorship, and I really don't think a lot of people in allied health actually know that they need to be and how to be mentors.
Amina Alahi:And I like to continuously pass it on.
Amina Alahi:So anybody who reaches out to me at any time who wants to know a little bit more about imaging, informatics, any aspect of my career, I always, you know, respond, and I will at least have one call with them.
Chandria Singleton:Oh, wow, that's amazing.
Chandria Singleton:Because you hit on things that I hadn't even thought about with the sponsorship.
Chandria Singleton:There is a difference.
Chandria Singleton:There is a huge difference, and one is not better than the other.
Chandria Singleton:I think having both is so valuable.
Chandria Singleton:As you were talking, I said, I think I've been a sponsor a lot of times, which is a good thing because I'm that kind of person.
Chandria Singleton:I'm like, if I see something and it's not for me, oh, I know somebody.
Chandria Singleton:I think a lot of us in radiology, in medical imaging, don't understand the power of networking.
Chandria Singleton:We're such a kind of quiet modality or medical profession, which maybe we've been made to be that way because we usually ignored, but it's always this negative connotation with our profession, and it's so untrue.
Chandria Singleton:But I think we've kind of fallen into it, into the stereotype of what medical imaging is, and just stay quiet.
Chandria Singleton:But I love the fact that more people who are so qualified, like yourselves, are coming out and articulating so well what the medical profession has within it, which is medical imaging and radiology.
Chandria Singleton:And it's beyond even just dealing with patients.
Chandria Singleton:Our scope is, I mean, like, I'm just blown away listening to you.
Chandria Singleton:I had no clue informatics was any of this, and I'm sure we're just scraping the surface.
Chandria Singleton:But that mentorship is what I feel like you are going to excel at, because as you continue to let people know what you do and that you are available for mentorship, pretty sure you're going to have to start creating something for that because a lot of people are looking for it and they need it.
Chandria Singleton:I try to encourage people get on LinkedIn, do more in LinkedIn, really get with other people without the idea that you have to get something.
Chandria Singleton:I think knowledge is truly power and really gaining the knowledge from people, and sometimes it takes being around them.
Chandria Singleton:Some things people just can't tell you.
Chandria Singleton:We have so many things.
Chandria Singleton:I mean, AI is just going to blow a lot of things out of the water.
Chandria Singleton:I'm excited.
Chandria Singleton:I want to talk to what advice would you have for radiology professionals if you could summarize maybe being an informaticist, excelling, moving to another level after you've been in the field for a while.
Chandria Singleton:What advice would you give radiology professions?
Chandria Singleton:Because you've done that after eight or ten years as a technologist, you moved from patient care over to the computer.
Chandria Singleton:The technical side.
Chandria Singleton:Tell us, what advice would you have for us?
Amina Alahi:A couple things.
Amina Alahi:I would say.
Amina Alahi:One, before you make a major career change, shadow someone, request informationals.
Amina Alahi:Don't do what you may have done in high school and you didn't actually do it.
Amina Alahi:Find out what someone's role is.
Amina Alahi:Imaging informatics, skies, the limits and there's.
Amina Alahi:Everyone has different roles and does different things.
Amina Alahi:You don't want to jump into something and turns out you don't like it.
Amina Alahi:Right.
Amina Alahi:Other things I would say in general, whether or not you decide to move on to do something else or not, continuing education is key.
Amina Alahi:It doesn't need to be formal classes if that's not your thing.
Amina Alahi:But learning outside of what you typically do just expand your mind and allows you to think more creatively.
Chandria Singleton:I like that you said invest in continuing education.
Chandria Singleton:I started learning about being an applications technologist early on in my career.
Chandria Singleton:I had a good friend worked for GE, and she always would do, and I'm like, man, she had big nice house in a part of town in Atlanta that was super expensive, her and her husband, really nice.
Chandria Singleton:And I just was like, it was rare that I saw female applications technologist number one.
Chandria Singleton:She was a hispanic Latina middle aged woman.
Chandria Singleton:That was even more rare to see as applications technologist.
Chandria Singleton:And we would just, we would request her to come and do our in services.
Chandria Singleton:Like she was just a really good person and she knew it like the back of her hand.
Chandria Singleton:I remember her telling every last one of us, you all should be doing this.
Chandria Singleton:And out of that group of us, one is a director of something something in the cancer center in Boston.
Chandria Singleton:The other girl went to Florida.
Chandria Singleton:She's a manager down in Florida of a big hospital.
Chandria Singleton:The other girl was over a heart center and I'm doing my thing.
Chandria Singleton:Sometimes you just need that person to tell you that you can do it.
Chandria Singleton:But I also invested my own money into sending myself to applications training as Siemens.
Amina Alahi:You have to invest in yourself.
Amina Alahi:We have to invest in ourselves.
Chandria Singleton:Yeah, it wasn't cheap, but I'm going to tell you, I turned around and booked several jobs that year, and I credit that to investing in myself.
Chandria Singleton:Nobody knew I paid for that but my family.
Chandria Singleton:I think what it did for me was gave me even more confidence in what I could do.
Chandria Singleton:I think I just had a whole nother attitude about me and that's what getting quality continuing education and investing in yourself does for you.
Chandria Singleton:I find that some people, they want to move to another modality.
Chandria Singleton:Like I just had a live on social media and people were saying, well, how do I move to another?
Chandria Singleton:Everybody wants on a job training.
Chandria Singleton:That's not always possible.
Chandria Singleton:You have to sometimes maybe pay three $4,000 to go to an MRI school.
Chandria Singleton:If you want to be an MRI technologist, you got to pay the people for the knowledge they're giving you, and you have to pay them for giving you the clinical exams.
Chandria Singleton:My thing is, if your job tells you we'll cross train you, I'm going to tell you you're not going to get all the exams you need because their priority is to have you there for what they're paying you.
Chandria Singleton:And that's if that's to do x ray or ct, that's what you're going to be doing.
Chandria Singleton:And you only got two years to get those exams.
Chandria Singleton:Pay the three $4,000, go to the school, take the registry and be done.
Chandria Singleton:What are you going to make after that?
Chandria Singleton:Your pay is going to go up.
Chandria Singleton:You can probably make what you need to make to pay $4,000 in a month back with a travel assignment I love.
Chandria Singleton:Like you said, invest.
Chandria Singleton:You have to invest.
Chandria Singleton:If you could tell everybody, how can they connect with you?
Chandria Singleton:Do you have social media, email?
Chandria Singleton:Where can they connect?
Chandria Singleton:A website?
Amina Alahi:My website is actually under construction, and I am working on developing a course that has very concrete details of how people can get into informatics without necessarily getting a formal degree.
Amina Alahi:My name is Mina Elahi.
Amina Alahi:LinkedIn and Facebook.
Amina Alahi:Great.
Chandria Singleton:And we're going to put everything in the description.
Chandria Singleton:What do you think the future of informatics is going to be for us imaging technologists?
Amina Alahi:The future of informatics is going to have rad techs getting involved in artificial intelligence.
Amina Alahi:Artificial intelligence is here to stay.
Amina Alahi:It's not going anywhere and is going to further evolve.
Amina Alahi:One of the ways to help you transition, or just to be a little happier in your role and help your role is texts are good at workflows, right?
Amina Alahi:But make sure you're documenting those workflows every step that happens and what's happening in between.
Amina Alahi:The steps that may be seemingly invisible and how to improve those steps.
Amina Alahi:Imaging informatics literally do that all day.
Amina Alahi:The skills are there and that is not going anywhere.
Amina Alahi:It's going to continue to evolve.
Amina Alahi:Everything is about how to make things more efficient, efficiency while providing the best patient care.
Chandria Singleton:Oh, my goodness.
Chandria Singleton:I will be the first one in that course when you get it started.
Chandria Singleton:I'm excited.
Chandria Singleton:This was a great conversation.
Chandria Singleton:I have been waiting on this interview all week long and you did not disappoint.
Chandria Singleton:And I forgot to mention you guys, she is an author.
Chandria Singleton:She authors, articles, scientists tipping abstracts and you are just amazing.
Chandria Singleton:Thank you Amina for being our guest.
Chandria Singleton:Be sure if you're watching this to subscribe on YouTube.
Chandria Singleton:Make sure you follow me on LinkedIn.
Chandria Singleton:Thank you all for taking the time out to listen and learn about radiology.
Chandria Singleton:And that's a wrap for this episode of a couple of Rad Techs podcasts.
Chandria Singleton:We hope you enjoyed our discussion of the fascinating world of radiology and learned something new about the role we play in the healthcare industry.
Chandria Singleton:If you have any questions or topics that you love for us to cover, feel free to reach out and let us know what they are.
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Chandria Singleton:And until next time, stay tuned for more insightful and informative episodes of a couple of Rad Techs podcast.
