High Technology Medical Equipment at McGill Hospitals
The MPU staff and graduate students have access to all types of modern high
technology equipment used in the diagnosis and treatment of disease with radiation.
The equipment is installed in McGill teaching hospitals and is primarily used for
clinical work; however, staff and students have access to the equipment for laboratory
and research work.
The major radiology and radiotherapy equipment at McGill is calibrated, maintained,
and serviced by the physicists and engineers of the Medical Physics department of the
Montreal General Hospital. This facilitates the access to equipment by the MPU staff
and students and gives the graduate students an excellent exposure to daily work and
responsibilities of clinical medical physicists and engineers.
The major medical equipment of interest to medical physicists in McGill teaching
hospitals is as follows: regular x-ray equipment for diagnostic radiology (some
100 x-ray rooms); 6 CT-scanners; 4 DSA units; 2 low energy linear accelerators for
x-ray radiotherapy; 5 high energy linear accelerators for x-ray and electron radiotherapy
(4 equipped with multileaf collimators); 1 cobalt unit for total body irradiation;
2 simulators; 2 CT-simulators; 1 remote afterloading unit; 2 PET scanners; a cyclotron
for production of radionuclides; and 4 SPECT cameras. In addition, there are 3 MRI
scanners; 10 treatment planning computers for 3-D treatment planning; treatment planning
systems for intensity modulated radiotherapy (IMRT), brachytherapy and stereotactic
radiosurgery; an assortment of calibration equipment, such as 3-D isodose plotters,
ionization chambers, thermoluminescent dosimetry readers, film densitometers, diode
arrays, etc.; and a wide variety of computer systems available for research and
development work.
The Medical Physics department of the MUHC also has an electronics shop and a machine
shop staffed with electronic engineers, technicians, and a skilled machinist who are
available to help the MPU staff and students with building their equipment for various
clinical as well as M.Sc. and Ph.D. thesis-related research projects.