Kent Roberts, Project manager for medical imaging

• Job: Project manager for medical imaging, WellStar Health System in Marietta.

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BARRY WILLIAMS/AJC Special

Kent Roberts is the project manager for medical imaging at WellStar Health System in Marietta.

• What I do: “I’m part of the team that operates our PACS (Picture Archiving and Communication System). Our medical imaging system is totally digital now.

“I also manage Medical Imaging Services, a group that is responsible for the maintenance of all equipment. We have five hospitals, 10 imaging centers and I wouldn’t begin to know how many pieces of equipment.”

• What got me interested in this: “A friend of mine was a radiologic technologist and I began talking with him about the field [during] my senior year in high school. After observing him at work, I decided to become a radiologic technologist.

“What appealed to me was being in a field where I could help people. I’ve been in it [for] 40 years.”

• Best part of my job: “The satisfaction of knowing that what I do makes a difference in patients’ lives. I’m helping to take care of them. Even though I’m no longer involved day-to-day with patients, the end result of what I do benefits patients.”

• Most challenging part of the job: “Keeping up with all the changes in technology is a challenge. They happen fast. When I started, we had automatic processing, but sometimes we had to develop films in wet tanks before radiologists could read them.

“When we got our first CT [computer tomographic] scanner, it took an hour-and-a-half before you could see the image. Now, the radiologists can see an image in a matter of seconds.”

• What people don’t know about my job: Although medical imaging deals with highly sophisticated technology, “if you don’t like working with people, this isn’t the job for you.”

• What keeps me going: “I love to solve problems, whether it’s trouble-shooting new equipment, implementing an upgrade or just figuring out how best to maintain something.

“Recently, [our] radiologists were having trouble pulling images from the system. It was running extremely slow. We worked with the vendor and our people and we finally found the problem.”

• Preparation needed: “Taking science courses in high school is important. [Prospective radiologic technologists] can get either a two-year or a four-year degree in radiologic technology and complete training in other modalities, such as nuclear medicine imaging.”

Registered radiologic technologists must pass a national certification exam through the American Registry of Radiologic Technologists. In Georgia, you must be licensed.

• Salary range: The median salary was $48,830 in 2006, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

— By Laura Raines, Pulse editor. Got an interesting job that you love? E-mail your story to pulseeditor@ajc.com.