It’s a Friday morning in October, and Dave Francoeur and Ken Maddock are walking down the hallway at Baylor Health Care System in Texas — nothing unusual for two veteran biomeds.

But this isn’t any ordinary day. Francoeur and Maddock — two leaders of AAMI’s Technology Management Council (TMC) — are “on location” being followed by a camera crew filming a new five-minute video to promote the biomed field as a career option.

The video, which is being developed by the TMC and produced by CTI Productions, features Maddock and Francoeur speaking about what a career in biomed entails and how to get involved; and will be available on AAMI’s new student website, www.aami.org/student.

“When you check in to a hospital as a patient, you probably take for granted that the medical equipment that surrounds you will work properly,” Maddock says during the video. “But most people don’t realize that there are skilled professionals responsible for ensuring that the technology performs safely and effectively.”

Francoeur, vice president of operations for facility and technological services at ARAMARK Healthcare, says the video is a great “way to potentially reach lots of individuals who might not ever have the opportunity to hear about our great profession.”

In particular, the video may have special appeal to high school students, who lack an awareness of the biomed profession. “Students watch videos, and get much better insight into things than if they just read the info,” says Lynda Wilkinson, program coordinator of electronics engineering technologies for North Seattle Community College.

“The video targets students who are voracious consumers of web-based and social networking tools,” says Maddock, vice president of clinical engineering and telecommunication services for Baylor. “Making a video available to students in a comfortable way will increase awareness of the field.”

The video may also help sway parents, who “are often led to believe that sending their child to a community college to get a two-year degree in a field such as biomedical equipment technician (BMET) is not good enough, and that only a four-year education has value,” Wilkinson says. “A good video showing the level of training and the career opportunities will be wonderful.”

SOURCE: AAMI News: December 2009, Vol. 44, No. 11