My Ultrasound Education

The first time I applied to ultrasound school in 2011, I was not accepted into the program at Bellevue College. Determined to get in, I spent more time working in patient care as a home care aide and volunteering at a hospital. In 2012, I was accepted into both the radiology technologist program and the sonography program and chose vascular ultrasound. Didactic year of ultrasound school was difficult, especially pathophysiology. The human body is fascinating and getting to use ultrasound waves to bounce around the body to image things is legitimately amazing.

Ultrasound education is no joke! It includes physics, anatomy and physiology, cross sectional anatomy, and pathophysiology. While in ultrasound school, I was convinced that I wouldn't' be able to get a job locally upon graduation. This was based on imposter syndrome and fear that my choosing one specialty would limit my choices. To boost my resume and network, I ran for our class vascular ultrasound representative and then for the Society for Vascular Ultrasound's Board of Directors. Little did I know that this professional growth would be so valuable to me. Meeting people from all over the country, representing students and new graduates' interests was an amazing experience. It really made me appreciate how diverse the healthcare industry is.

My externship sites were at Pacific Vascular's lab at Valley Medical and at EvergreenHealth's radiology department in the Seattle area. Both locations offered me a job, but my heart was set on working in the vascular world. Working at Pacific Vascular was one of the single most important career decisions I made. Being there for seven years, I learned so much about scanning, medicine, leadership and teamwork. One of my happy places working was at a hospital with both a cardiac and neuro ICU where I really got into investigating pathology.

Are you trying to get into ultrasound school?

My biggest advice is to attend a CAAHEP accredited program. This way, you can sit for your ARDMS boards upon graduation. There are programs that will say they're accredited, but they are NOT CAAHEP accredited, they're some other random accrediting body.

This means you will not be able to sit for your boards upon graduation.

Check for CAAHEP accredited programs here.

Read about the ARDMS requirements for board eligibility here.

There is a really active and helpful sonographer facebook group called Sonographers Do It In The Dark, join here. If you search the posts there, you'll find a ton of posts about programs and school and the career.

I'll write a more in-depth post about getting into and surviving sonography school soon.