First female President of IPEM

02/10/2023

THE first woman to become President of IPEM has been appointed to the role.

Dr Anna Barnes, an IPEM Fellow, became the Institute’s first female President after her appointment was confirmed at the Annual General Meeting.

Dr Barnes said: ‘My aim is not to be the first and only female President this decade and I feel really privileged to take on this role at this exciting time for IPEM.

‘I’m really looking forward to my presidency and to pushing forward on important matters like equity of opportunity, diversity of thinking and inclusion across academia, industry and public healthcare.

‘I have stepped into this role because I felt the time had come that a woman needed to step into a leadership position so that almost half of our members can see that they can also do this job.

‘You can’t be what you can’t see, and I want to say to my male colleagues you are part of this journey and you are our allies.’

A Clinical Scientist in the School of Biomedical Engineering and Imaging Sciences at King’s College London, and a Director of the King’s Technology Evaluation Centre at KCL, Dr Barnes has been involved with IPEM throughout her career.

IPEM trainee

She was one of the first two IPEM trainees in Scotland in 1993, specializing in biomedical engineering and equipment management. Dr Barnes then went on to have a career in medical imaging, graduating with a PhD in 1999 from the University of Glasgow followed by two Fellowships at New York University and Columbia University, focusing on neuroimaging and statistical analysis.

Dr Barnes then pursued a research fellowship at the University of Cambridge Brain Mapping Unit before joining University College London Hospital nuclear medicine department as the lead Clinical Scientist for the newly installed Siemens mMR Biograph PET MRI scanner. During this time, she was awarded two NIHR research fellowships to validate, evaluate and deploy imaging biomarkers in oncology and was appointed Chief Healthcare Scientist for the South-East for NHS England.

Volunteer roles

Her volunteer roles at IPEM have included two years as Vice President External and as Vice President Academic.

Dr Barnes said: ‘Through all of this I have continued to mentor, nurture and supervise students from primary school to post-graduate education in the hope that I can encourage just one of them to follow a career in STEM.’

Dr Robert Farley, who is now Immediate Past President of IPEM, said: ‘I am delighted Anna is our new President. She has many exciting ideas for taking both IPEM and the medical physics and clinical engineering professions forward.

‘I wholeheartedly support her aim to build on the equity, diversity and inclusion work done by IPEM and to make it sustainable for the foreseeable future.’

* IPEM Fellow Dr Penelope Allisy-Roberts OBE was President of the Institute of Physical Sciences in Medicine between 1990-92, a forerunner of what became IPEM in 1997. Christine Segasby was President of the Association of Medical Technologies between 1992-94, another forerunner of IPEM.