(From left) Nichole Sands and Jennifer Love of VCU Health (Photo by Jay Paul)
Like many people, I don’t enjoy medical testing. So, when I had to go to the Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center downtown for a test, I was anxious. Actually, “terrified” is a better word for the way I was feeling. That is, until I met Jennifer Love and Nichole Sands, both certified nuclear medicine technologists.
Love is the supervisor of PET (positron emission tomography) imaging, and Sands does both nuclear medicine and PET imaging. The two made me feel comfortable, understood and even confident about letting them guide me through testing. And, if that weren’t enough, they made me laugh, a simple reaction that made me feel less frightened and was much appreciated.
Love, who grew up in Centreville and graduated from Randolph-Macon College and VCU, was down to her last $2 when she decided to go back to college for nuclear medicine. “I’m an athlete, and I wanted to do physical therapy, but at that time, there were not that many classes. I have an interest in anatomy, physiology and physics — all my nerdy superpowers combined,” she says, noting that her sister is a pathologist who helped pave the way for her interest in the medical field. “I had never heard of nuclear medicine until I started flipping through a course guide.”
Sands, another VCU alum who grew up in Spotsylvania, came to Richmond to pursue a degree in biomedical engineering but discovered she didn’t really like the field. “I was on a hunt to combine my interest in medicine and science,” she says. She took a one-credit class in clinical radiation and was intrigued. “I liked the radiology component,” she says, “then I discovered nuclear medicine and thought, ‘I like medicine, physiology and science.’”
In their jobs, Love and Sands work closely with other modalities in radiology. “What I really like about nuclear medicine is we are investigating physiology,” Love says. “We are looking at how the organ systems are working and functioning.”
The protocol for testing relies on step-by-step guidelines, and Love enjoys working within those guidelines to get the best study. “I know what I am looking at and how I can get the best out of the camera and the patient so we all get the final report,” she says. “I get to use my brain every single day to troubleshoot within the guidelines.”
Sands, who loves a good riddle and figuring out puzzles, finds the job fascinating and credits her high school physics teacher for helping spark her interest in physics. “We get to do a lot of interesting studies. I really like being able to look at how organ systems function,” she says, noting that studies can be ordered to look at specific things. “A study may not be ordered the same way for every person.”
Both women love working with and getting to know the people they test.
“No one comes to see us because they feel great,” Love says. “Sometimes you prove everybody healthy and normal, and sometimes not. Sometimes, it stops [patients] in their tracks. I say, ‘It’s OK, I’ve got you.’ Nobody cries alone when I am around. I make sure there is trust while in my presence, and I enjoy that challenge.”
The patient must be an active participant in the testing to get a good study, Love adds. “They have to play a part by letting me know as a technologist how I can help them — do you want music during the test? Do you want silence? Etc.”
Sands enjoys educating patients about the testing they’ll undergo. “I like feeling like they have confidence in what is happening to them,” she says. “I like watching their studies and discovering what’s going on, and I like being able to help provide that answer for them.”
She’s learned how to read people when she meets them, she says. “If they are anxious, I can spend a lot of time talking to them. I want them to feel like they had an idea of what happened and what imaging we performed for them.”
While both Love and Sands attest to being introverts away from work, they have learned to be the opposite at work. “Being extroverted is what is needed on my job,” Sands says. “I want to be caring and compassionate. I like to be funny. Being able to add levity to a situation is important and not be so gosh darn serious.”
“This is where we get to bring in ourselves,” Love adds. “When you get a good team together, it brings out that much more in each of us.”
Thanks to both these professionals, my testing actually turned out to be a pleasant experience — did I mention the dance party at the end? “There are a lot of things we can do to be creative,” Love says. “We just want people to feel good about this part of the journey.”
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