World Patient Safety Day: Medical Physicists in Hospitals Matter

World Patient Safety Day, proclaimed by the UN and coordinated by WHO [1], is observed annually on September 17 since 2019. Established by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2019. This global public health related observance aims to raise global awareness about patient safety, reduce avoidable harm in healthcare settings, and foster a culture of safer healthcare practices worldwide. This year, the observance is guided by the slogan “Safe care for life!” to highlight the critical need to safeguard individuals managing long-term health conditions from preventable medical error.

This year, there is also a need to highlight the vital role of medical physicists played in ensuring patient safety within hospitals, particularly in radiation-dependent departments like radiotherapy, radiology, and nuclear medicine. According to AAPM (2025) [2], the primary responsibility of medical physicists is to guarantee that life-saving radiation doses are delivered with maximum precision. In cancer treatment, they meticulously verify patient-specific treatment plans, checking software calculations to target tumors accurately while shielding surrounding healthy tissues. AMPI (n.d.) [3] informs that medical physicists besides quality assurance and commissioning of equipment oversee comprehensive quality assurance programs for advanced machines, such as linear accelerators, CT, and MRI scanners, ensuring optimal calibration. By continuously minimizing radiation hazards and resolving complex technical issues, they serve as essential guardians against medical errors and excessive exposure.

In today's India, the growth of healthcare facilities has brought cutting-edge medical technologies—including radiotherapy, PET-CT scans, and sophisticated diagnostic tools—from big cities into smaller regional hospitals. At the heart of this technological progress is the medical physicist, whose work is essential yet often overlooked. They play a vital role in keeping patients safe, improving the effectiveness of cancer treatments, and managing radiation safety for healthcare workers and communities.

Despite this significant contribution to public health and the tech economy, medical physics is largely unknown as a career option to school-age students, often overshadowed by conventional engineering and standard computer science programs. This gap in early career exposure creates a shortage of skilled professionals in specific regions, leaving young people unaware of the diverse career paths available through India's National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 framework. There is a need for embedding an accessible medical literacy and physics module at the middle school level, this project demystifies an essential healthcare sector, democratizes specialized STEM concepts, and empowers a diverse generation of students to envision socially meaningful careers at the intersection of science and human wellness.

References

[1] WHO. (n.d.). World Patient Safety Day 2026, https://www.who.int/campaigns/world-patient-safety-day/2026

[2]American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM). (2025). AAPM Medical Physics Practice Guideline 10.b: Scope of practice for clinical medical physics. Journal of Applied Clinical Medical Physics, 26(11)

[3] AMPI (n.d.). Association of Medical Physicists of India, https://ampi.org.in/