The Radiography Department at Tygerberg Hospital is breaking new grounds in the field of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI).
The department is the first in South Africa to offer a structured one-year post-graduate course in MRI. The Health Professions council of South Africa (HPCSA) has approved the course as an additional qualification. Six radiographers successfully completed the course last year.

MRI has become the imaging modality of choice in the management of patients who present with various medical histories. This is because MRI can image virtually every part of the body.

Ms Valdiela Daries, a lecturer in the department and the MRI course co-ordinator, said traditionally radiographers have received “on-the-job” training to operate the very expensive, sophisticated imaging equipment with no significant background of MRI physics, principles and techniques.

“The MRI course was developed, not only for the need for radiographers to develop professionally, but new technological advances in MRI are introduced regularly. It has become essential for radiographers to be informed of the latest international developments,” said Ms Daries.

The radiographers attend block periods for lectures. Various radiologists, engineers, technicians, application specialists and radiographers lecture during the course. Experts in the field act as examiners, moderators, presenters and demonstrators. The students are required to do 700 hours of practical training in their workplace.

“As the Council on Higher Education (CHE) requires proof of acceptance from the radiography professional body before they consider our application, we will shortly forward our application to the CHE for institutional accreditation,” said Ms Daries.

CAPTION:

First graduates of the Postgraduate certificate in Magnetic Resonance Imaging. At the back: Mr Carlo Wagner (Symington & Partners: N1 City), Ms Monique van Niekerk (Schnetler & Partners: Panorama), Ms Patricia Heidmann (Morton & Partners: Claremont), Ms Bronwen Mackrill (Morton & Partners: Claremont), Ms Natalie Bennie (Tuft & Partners, Constantiaberg). In front: Ms Estelle Arendse (Tygerberg Academic Hospital), Ms Valdiela Daries (CPUT lecturer and course co-ordinator), Ms Naomi Fenton (HOD: Symington & Partners and course co-ordinator).

Written by CPUT News
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

The Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) postgraduate course offered by the Radiography Department at the Tygerberg Hospital Campus is reaching a wider audience as it now also attracts international students.

The course, which dates back to 2005, is currently the only professional development course available to South African radiographers who wish to obtain a recognised additional qualification in the field of MRI.

Among 11 students who registered this year, was one from Uganda.

The Ugandan student is completing his clinical component at the Radiology Department in Johannesburg, Gauteng.

According to Valdiela Daries, a Radiography lecturer at the department, the student will use his newly acquired knowledge and skills to educate radiographers in his own country.

All lectures take place in the Radiography Training Division at the Tygerberg Hospital Campus.

The course consists of two components, of which both have to be completed at the end of the academic year which begins in January and ends in December of each year.

The course covers both the theoretical component and the clinical component.

The MRI students attended the second compulsory academic block from the 24th to the 28th of August 2009.

During the academic block, students received various lectures on advanced imaging techniques in MRI.

Daries said the students also presented interesting case studies and completed a compulsory examination.

To date, 25 radiographers from South Africa have successfully completed the MRI postgraduate certificate course.

Daries said: “Successful students will obtain the additional qualification in MRI in December 2009.”

The MRI is one of the imaging modalities with the fastest moving technological advances.

These new technological advances have created an enormous opportunity for radiographers to become specialist in the field of MRI.

Radiographers who use MR imager should fully understand the principles of how this powerful modality works in order to contribute positively to the management of the patient.

The department only accepts a maximum of 10 candidates per year.

The admission requirements include a diploma or degree in Diagnostic Radiography or equivalent qualification.

A minimum of two years experience in Computed Tomography coupled with professional registration with the Health Professional Council of South Africa also serve as requirements.

CPUT’s Radiography Department is still the only department that offers a post-graduate course in MRI in South Africa.

By Andiswa Dantile

Written by CPUT News
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

The Nursing Science Department hopes that self-defence classes for first-year students will help to keep the aspiring nurses safe.

The scourge of gender-based violence in the country and a recent attack on a nursing student outside Tygerberg Hospital prompted the Department to act.

“With the national focus on gender-based violence last year, the Department decided that we had to take the lead and help our students to empower themselves,” said lecturer, Suveena Singh.
She said the lessons were offered free of charge as part of the orientation programme for the first-years.

The lessons were presented by Shihan Mike Chong and students were shown basic techniques to vend off an attacker.

Students enjoyed the classes and said they were grateful for the skills they had been equipped with.

“It taught me to always be aware of my surroundings and to protect myself,” said first-year student, Sphesihle Mngomezulu.

Written by Ilse Fredericks
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

With the Dental Sciences Department based at the Tygerberg Hospital, students have the unique opportunity to hone their skills in industry.

Dental Science students are skilled to design and manufacture dental items such as dentures, bridges, crowns, fillings and braces.

The unique setting at the Parow based hospital allows students to work directly with patients and medical staff.

At the campus, which is housed in the Sarleh Dollie Building, students have access to a library, state at the art laboratories as well as high-tech equipment.

The campuses also houses students who are enrolled in the Dental Assisting certificate programme, as well several offices of lecturers from the Medical Imaging and Therapeutic Sciences Department (previously Radiography).

These lecturers are involved in clinical assessments and demonstrations with their students, who complete their practical training at the Tygeberg hospital.

View Tygerberg Campus maps and contact details

Written by CPUT News
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Apart from six main campuses in Bellville, Cape Town, Wellington, Mowbray, Athlone and Granger Bay CPUT also has a number of satellite campuses across the city.

These include Tygerberg Hospital, Groote Schuur, the Media City building on the Foreshore and Roeland Street which is a few short minutes from the main Cape Town campus.

Media City is the latest addition to the list of CPUT campuses after students and staff of the Architecture and Interior Design schools moved from the Thomas Patullo building last year.

At Tygerberg Hospital Dental Technology as well as Emergency Medical Care students (EMC) are catered for in a teaching and learning environment perfect for their courses.

Dental Technology students work closely with Dentistry students from the University of the Western Cape in a scenario which closely mimics their future professional relationships.

EMC students work closely with the city’s paramedical service operator from Tygerberg hospital as well.

The Radiography Department is the only one located at the Groote Schuur satellite campus. Students benefit from an authentic learning experience because of the hospital environment and also meet many of their future peers.

Roeland Street is the temporary home to the Media School which includes Journalism, Photography, Public Relations and Multimedia. These departments will eventually be moved to their permanent home on the main Cape Town campus.

Maps and contact details for Groote Schuur Hospital

Maps and contact details for Roeland Street Building

Maps and contact details for Tygerberg Hospital

Written by Lauren Kansley
Tel: +27 21 953 8646
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Liaises with the media and writes press releases about interesting developments at CPUT.

With millions of new cases of cancer reported each year, researchers across the globe are working tirelessly to develop new and smarter ways to fight cancer.

One such is CPUT’s Dr Stefan Abel, whose groundbreaking research in the field of chemoprevention has recently earned him a coveted National Research Foundation (NRF) rating. Abel is the latest researcher at CPUT to be awarded this accolade and joins a growing list of NRF rated researchers at the university.

Based in the Institute of Biomedical and Microbial Biotechnology, Abel currently heads the institute’s Chemoprevention Research Group, which is located at the Tygerberg Hospital. The group’s emphasizes of chemoprevention research focuses on South African herbal teas, such as rooibos, and dietary unsaturated fatty acids, such as omega-3, which can influence the physical and biological cellular responses that are significant during carcinogenesis (cancer development).

While cancer remains a daunting public health challenge, Abel says he has never regretted his decision to pursue this area of research.

His springboard into this field was in 1992 when he joined the Medical Research Council and was tasked with investigating the role of fatty acids in cancer development and chemopreventive properties of n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA).

More than two decades later, Abel has established himself as a leading researcher in his field, having published 34 scientific publications and four book chapters, along with 55 national conference presentations, close to 40 international conference presentations and numerous articles in local and internal magazines and specialized publications.

Abel says his research work is focused on characterizing the pattern of lipid alterations in cancer tissue, which creates an environment for the promotion and survival of cancer cells.

“The research I have conducted has provided further insight into the complex lipid alterations occurring in cancer development, with the aim of defining and optimising specific fatty acids to be used as chemopreventive agents,” he says.

Through dietary manipulation, which is largely based on specific fatty acids, such as omega-3, Abel and his team of researchers hope to stunt the growth of these cells.

“The link between nutrition and chemoprevention is of particular relevance, which is reflected by the inclusion of a nutritional aspect to my research focus, besides chemoprevention which it compliments. Therefore, my research activities have grown to reflect this by incorporating relevant studies with the aim to implement them in a chemoprevention strategy.”

Abel says the core research over the last eight years has remained the same, with the main objective to investigate the role of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) in cancer development in humans, utilising animal cancer models and cell culture. Past research involved liver and colon cancer, while future studies will also include prostate cancer.

Written by Candes Keating
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Provides coverage for the Engineering and Applied Sciences Faculties; the Bellville and Wellington Campuses, and research and innovation news.

Staff members and students from the Department of Emergency Medical Sciences stepped in at short notice to volunteer their services at Tygerberg Hospital’s trauma unit after several nursing staff members were unable to report for duty because of the taxi strike.

“The staff were informed by students who were working the day shift on Monday that they were asked to stay the night and to assist with the workload. The on-duty doctor also called on us to assist, which we gladly did’, said Head of the Emergency Medical Sciences Department, Dr Simpiwe Sobuwa.

The staff members were Sobuwa, Roxanne Maritz, Elroy Cameron, John Meyer and Raina Gihwala.

Sobuwa said many of the staff members were part of the cohort who travelled to Turkiye earlier this year to assist Gift of Givers during a relief mission following the devastating earthquakes.

The tasks they assisted with included:

• Administering patient-prescribed pain medication and general medication.
• Putting up Intravenous lines
• Helping to transfer ventilated patients from the hospital bed to the CT scan and taking them back to the ward.
• Waiting with patients to be seen by CT
• Triaging
• Assisting with bleeding control

Describing the experience, Gihwala said beds were scarce and patients were lying on the floor - some with only the clothing they had come in with.

“As we arrived, we immediately started with pain management. Some patients had gotten pain meds the day before and had not been able to receive the day’s pain meds, let alone on the hourly as prescribed.

“Being able to bring pain relief to so many patients made all the difference. In what may seem like a minuscule task to some, 'easy' to quickly sort out was the hardest task to get to but gave the greatest mental healing for those who knew the wait was far from over, but the reassurance they could wait a little longer now that their pain had been relieved,” said Gihwala.

Maritz said helping in the trauma unit as extra staff was an intense and rewarding experience.

“The fast-paced environment of Monday night demanded quick thinking from the team, exceptional teamwork and the ability to stay composed under pressure. The camaraderie amongst all members in the unit from nursing staff, doctors, students and our colleagues made patient treatment flow like a well-oiled machine.”

Written by Ilse Fredericks

Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.