2015 FELLOW OF THE SECTION AWARD

This award is given in recognition of significant and substantial contributions
to the mission of the SMRT.

Vera Kimbrell BS (RT) (MR), FSMRT attended the University of Central Arkansas & the Baptist School of Radiology in Little Rock Ar. She completed Radiology school in the spring of 1981 and her BS in Health Care in the fall of the same year.

Vera worked in CT and Ultrasound at the Baptist Hospital and obtained RDMS certification in 1984. When MRI was introduced clinically in 1985 she was chosen as the first MRI Technologist at Baptist Hospital. After years of experience gained by on the job training and participation in many MRI educational seminars Vera began to share her expertise. She took on the added responsibility of training and teaching MR to new technologists and Radiology students. When the second system was added in 1988 Vera was promoted to Lead Technologist and Manager of the site. In the winter of 1993 she moved to Massachusetts and accepted a position as a Staff Technologist at the Brockton location for Shields Health Care.

Vera has continued her education by completing several courses toward a Master’s Degree in Health Care Administration, but her passion has always been education. Vera passed the first MR registry, which was given in 1995. In 1999 she was given the responsibility of protocol development and staff education at Shields and in 2001 was promoted to MR Application Specialist and Trainer for all 16 sites located throughout Mass and RI. Vera has been developed numerous presentations and has been an invited speaker many times. She has traveled extensively to promote quality education and professionalism. In 2002 Shields introduced an MRI accelerated internship program for RT’s which in conjunction with MCP in Boston, MA.

In 2012 Vera left Shields and joined the Brigham and Women’s Hospital as Clinical Educator for the MR dept. This move allowed her to gain experience in Research and learn new and innovative technology. BWH is a top 10 hospitals and allows many opportunities for growth and development.

Vera has been a member of the SMRT since 2002. She has served in various roles and participated in annual meetings since 2005. As a member of the Policy Board and in many key executive roles Vera has tried to advocate for MR technologists and the SMRT in every avenue of the Healthcare industry. She continues to play active roles and hopes to continue serving the SMRT for many years to come.

 
Titti Owman, R.T.(R)(CT)(MR), FSMRT registered as a Radiological Technologist/Nurse in December 1979 and in January 1980 she started to work at the Department of Radiology in Lund. In 1981 she became involved in a clinical trial of the first non-iodine contrast agent and has since been involved in many different research projects. Titti is now serving on the Lund University’s clinical MRI research committee.
In 1983 she went on to become involved in the very first NMR imaging attempts in Scandinavia at the Department of Radiation Physics at Lund University.
 
Currently Titti is a Research coordinator/lecturer at the Center for Imaging and Physiology, Lund University Hospital, Sweden. Since 1986, when the first clinical MRI-scanner was installed in Lund, she has been working in clinical practice; research related work as well as MRI-safety. Titti is responsible for MRI safety education and routines to all staff in the medical imaging center as well as other clinics and hospitals.
She is very much involved in organizing and planning various MRI research projects, mainly in the field of neuroradiology and she is actively taking part in several of them.
 
In 1988-89 she worked for the Fonar Corporation, New York as an application specialist traveling in Europe and USA. From 1991-1993 she worked as assistant manager and helped to start up one of Sweden’s first private MRI-clinics where she did administrative work as well as clinical practice.

Titti is a founding member, and still active, in the Lund School of MRI. She is responsible for organizing courses and lecturing for many different professional groups in the hospital and at the university. She has held the position of Course Director for MRI education for technologists at the University since 1995. Titti has been engaged by the Swedish Society of Neuroradiology to plan and organize nine courses in Neuroradiology and Spinal Imaging in Cyprus, Tenerife and Mallorca since 2002. In 2002 she was engaged in planning, organizing and starting up the first 3T MRI scanner in Scandinavia. In the spring of 2008 she was speaker and co-organizer of the SMRT’s first meeting in Scandinavia held in Aarhus, Denmark. She has been co-author on scientific papers and invited speaker on many occasions. In 2003, 2004 and 2009 she was invited lecturer at the European Congress of Radiology in Vienna, Austria. During the fall of 2013 she is involved in starting an advanced course for MR-radiographers, the first of its kind in Sweden. She is also an active member of the Swedish National board for Contrast Agents, MR-section.
Between 2009 and 2012 she served as a member of the SMRT Policy Board and chairman for Global Relations committee. At present she is a member of several other SMRT committees. She served as expert reviewer for the SMRT magazine Signals in 2010.

Titti was an active member of the local organising committee for the yearly ISMRM meeting in Stockholm in 2010. She was also active in the process of creating the ISMRM/SMRT Nordic Chapter that was founded in 2012.

At present she is a Member of the ISMRM Safety Committee and also a member of an international MR-safety group whose aim is recommending minimum requirements for a research scientist performing MRI in human subjects. Furthermore, she was chairman and organiser of the ISMRM workshop on Health and Safety in Lund, Sweden in September 2012. She was also a member of the organising committee arranging the MR-safety workshop in Washington DC in September 2014.

At present Titti is an active member of a group starting up a national 7 Tesla facility within Lund University Bioimaging Center. She is also a member of a national group that has purchased and is soon to start up a 7T research facility that is going to serve researchers, national as well as international. Titti is also representing ISMRM Safety Committee as an active member of the European MR-safety Group currently active in the process dealing with the EU-directive and derogation regarding MRI-workers an electromagnetic field exposure limits. In November 2015 she is also hosting a European MR-safety course in Lund, Sweden.

In an effort to be able to keep up with what’s going on in the fast world of MRI she is a frequent visitor to MRI-meetings and other MR-sites, national as well as international ones.

Titti considers it a great honour to be nominated as Fellow of the Section Award Recipient and she is always willing to promote and represent SMRT and ISMRM nationally and internationally.