Radiating change: One student’s vision for rural nuclear medicine

Struggling with an illness in college, Angela Gearhardt, MS, needed an MRI of her brain. But because local facilities in her rural area of Kansas could not produce high-quality images, she had to wait two months for an appointment elsewhere.

“At first, I thought this was just normal,” says Angela, now in her third year of the Medical Physics PhD program at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Houston Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. “We don’t get medical care in rural areas because we don’t have it.”

Nuclear technology—central to many advanced imaging and cancer treatments—had long fascinated Angela, who was majoring in nuclear engineering at Kansas State University and working at a research reactor.

“One of my bosses knew I was sick and frustrated with the medical system,” she says. “He had worked in medical physics before and suggested I consider a career in it.”

After completing her undergraduate degree, Angela earned a master’s degree in medical physics at the University of Oklahoma. The field applies physics to diagnose and treat diseases, such as radiation oncology, diagnostic imaging, and nuclear medicine.

“I found that I really loved working with patients,” she says. “They came in for a very specific type of treatment for brain cancer, and they saw these big scary-looking machines with a lot of radiation. I enjoyed being able to address their concerns, help them know what to expect, and in general make the process easier and less fearful for them.”

While Angela could have gone directly into residency after completing her master’s degree, she set her sights on loftier goals. If she earned a PhD, she could enter management and help make radiation oncology technology more accessible to rural patients.

Choosing MD Anderson UTHealth Houston Graduate School for her PhD program felt like a natural decision. Its location in the largest medical center in the world, connection with a major hospital system, and pioneering use of treatments not found elsewhere offered her the ideal environment in which to grow. 

“The people here are not only extremely knowledgeable, but they’re also really friendly and eager to teach,” Angela says. “I have even been able to collaborate with manufacturers of medical devices for my research, which is something I don’t think I could do anywhere else.”

Her research focuses on helping patients with electronic medical devices, such as pacemakers, continuous glucose monitors, and neurostimulators for Parkinson’s disease, safely access radiation therapy. Because too much radiation can damage these devices, Angela works to determine the safe threshold for radiation exposure and develop guidelines for treatment.  

“Right now, patients with these devices have limited options with radiation therapy because we don’t fully understand the way radiation causes damage,” she says. “The more we can learn, the more options patients will have.”

Angela pursues her PhD with help from the American Legion Auxiliary Fund scholarship. The award provides financial support that helps in practical ways such as covering costs for experiments and paying expenses to attend scientific conferences to share her discoveries. As a participant in research through a National Institutes of Health grant that was recently canceled, she appreciates how scholarships can serve as lifelines for students when other resources disappear.

“It’s really made a big difference for me,” she says.

After completing her PhD, Angela will match to a medical physics residency, similar to how medical students match to residency programs. She hopes to become a clinical medical physicist in radiation oncology in a rural clinic.

“Having once needed care that wasn’t available, I’m looking forward to taking everything I’ve learned and applying it to help patients in the same situation have better access,” she says. “It will be coming full circle in a really rewarding way.”