Career Outcomes
Our graduates have found successful placement in a diverse variety of positions.
Alumni have served as clinical medical physicists in institutions such as Duke, St. Jude Children’s Hospital (Memphis), Henry Ford Hospital (Detroit), Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (New York), St. Vincent Hospital (Indianapolis), Atlas Medical Physics (Newport Beach), Northwest Medical Physics Center (Washington State), US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and the US Air Force, to name just a few. For further training, our MS graduates have matriculated into PhD or MD programs, and both MS and PhD students have entered into top residency programs nationwide.
Our graduates have held academic positions at MD Anderson, Cleveland State (in affiliation with Cleveland Clinic), Duke, and others. Finally, graduates have found other unique opportunities such as at NIH, GE Healthcare, Varian Medical Systems, Landauer, and McKinsey Consulting.
The following charts show the initial jobs for our MS and PhD graduates from the past 5 years. The pie charts show percentages, then the same data is shown as absolute numbers of graduates in the stacked columns. All numbers come from Tables 3 and 4 below.
Initial Placement for MS Graduates
| Category | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | Last 5 yrs |
| Clinical | 1 | 3 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 8 |
| Residency | 6 | 4 | 6 | 4 | 8 | 28 |
| PhD/MD | 2 | 7 | 6 | 8 | 5 | 28 |
| Industry | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 4 |
| Other | 2 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 7 |
| Total MS graduates | 12 | 17 | 14 | 16 | 16 | 75 |
Graduates trained in Medical Physics enjoy a wide variety of employment opportunities, including academic, research and clinical paths. Learn where our alumni have gone after they graduated.
Initial Placement for PhD Graduates
| Category | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | Last 5 yrs |
| Clinical | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Residency | 2 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 6 |
| Academic | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 7 |
| Industry | 0 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 5 |
| Other | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 6 |
| TOTAL PhD graduates | 4 | 6 | 5 | 7 | 3 | 25 |
Half of our MS graduates go on to residency or academic positions. Residency is the most frequent initial placement for both MS and PhD students. Over the past decade, MS students account for 37.3% of our graduates going on to residency.
Number of Graduates
Employment Opportunities
Students at the Ph.D. level with interest in academic careers will find jobs as faculty members in departments of Medical Physics, Radiology, Radiation Oncology, Nuclear Medicine, Physics or Nuclear Engineering. Additionally, Ph.D. graduates may be employed in government labs or in industry. Ph.D. students trained with a specialty in Health Physics may find employment as Radiation Safety Officers at universities or large laboratories, or they may be employed as faculty in Health Physics training programs.
In addition to the academic and research job opportunities for Medical Physics graduates, there is also the career path of clinical physicist. Every hospital and clinic that uses radiation requires the services of individuals trained to maintain the diagnostic and therapeutic equipment needed to serve patients. Medical Physicists in Radiation Oncology also participate directly in clinical service by performing treatment planning for patients according to the treatment regimen prescribed by the Radiation Oncologist. Clinical physicists may be employed at the M.S. or Ph.D. level. The Duke Medical Physics Program would provide the specialized training necessary for graduates to become board-eligible clinical physicists if they so choose.
For more general information, we recommend the AAPM Career Services Website.
Updated September 23, 2024.
Placement information is self-reported.
