Examining the bigger picture with University of Malaya’s Professor Ng Kwan Hoong, who turned heads in the international medical community when he became the first scientist from a developing nation to receive this prestigious medical physics award in 2018
For someone who’s just been given a prestigious award by the international medical physics community, one may easily mistake Professor Ng Kwan Hoong as the intimidating type.
That is, until you see him opening doors for janitors and chatting congenially with taxi drivers on his way to our meeting.
“I’ve always believed in sincerity and basic etiquette,” says Ng. “Society unfortunately tends to think that you have to be a doctor or lawyer in order to contribute meaningfully. But they forget others like clerks or technicians who also contribute to society every day in their own ways.”
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For his pioneering work in the field of medical physics in Malaysia, Ng was awarded the prestigious Marie Sklodowska-Curie Award in 2018 by the International Organisation For Medical Physics.
An honour reserved for scientists who have contributed significantly to the education of medical physicists, the award was yet another milestone in Ng’s impressive list of achievements.
Image is everything
Gifted with the ability to explain complex concepts in simple terms, Ng explains the impact his work has on the average Malaysian today.
“Imagine a patient taking a mammogram. First, you have to make sure you can see the affected area clearly to be able to diagnose whether it is cancerous or not,” says Ng. “If you don’t diagnose properly, you could send a cancer patient away thinking that she doesn’t have cancer. On the other hand, if a patient doesn’t have cancer, but you report that she does, she’ll start worrying, having her breasts removed unnecessarily and all that.
“My job is to ensure that our medical imaging quality is of the highest possible standard so these things don’t happen.”
