Mission Statement

The mission of the Froedtert & MCW Diagnostic Medical Sonography (DMS) Program is to provide high quality academic and clinical education that equips interns with the technical knowledge, procedural skills and professional foundations to provide high quality, compassionate medical imaging.

Graduates will be able to adapt to varied health care settings requiring critical thinking with diverse patient populations. Furthermore, each will possess the ability to effectively interact with care teams in providing the best possible patient-centered care.

Resources

Please check back here for additional information and the program application.

Learning Outcomes

The goal of the Froedtert & MCW Diagnostic Medical Sonography program is:

  • To prepare competent entry-level sonographers in the cognitive (knowledge), psychomotor (skills), and affective (behavior) learning domains for the abdomen-extended concentration.
  • To prepare competent entry-level sonographers in the cognitive (knowledge), psychomotor (skills), and affective (behavior) learning domains for the obstetrics & gynecology concentration.
  • To prepare competent entry-level sonographers in the cognitive (knowledge), psychomotor (skills), and affective (behavior) learning domains for the vascular concentration.

Additionally, as part of our educational commitment to the student and with the continuous quality improvement as our basis, the DMS program is designed to provide:

  • Clinical Competency
    • The student will operate imaging equipment and accessory devices to produce quality sonographic studies.
    • The student will practice principles of safety while performing sonographic procedures on children and adults.
  • Communication
    • The student will demonstrate effective verbal/nonverbal communication skills with patients and healthcare staff.
  • Critical Thinking
    • The student will demonstrate the ability to solve clinical problems and assessment skills necessary to provide patient care.
    • The student will demonstrate the ability to make decisions and use independent judgment.
  • Professionalism
    • The student will discuss and demonstrate professional and ethical behavior.
    • The student will support the profession’s code of ethics and comply with the profession’s scope of practice.

Application for the Registry: American Registry of Diagnostic Medical Sonography

Students in good standing who have met all the clinical and didactic requirements of the program will be eligible to apply for registry examinations in the specialties of abdomen, obstetrics and gynecology, and vascular technology. The registry examination is computer based. The student will schedule with a testing center to take the exam.

The School of Diagnostic Medical Sonography will exceed the JRC-DMS standards regarding ARDMS pass rate and job placement rates by setting the following standards:

  • 85% of all graduates will successfully complete AB, OB or RVT examination on the first attempt and 100% of all graduates will successfully complete the examination within two attempts.
  • 85% of all students entering their second year will complete all second year courses and the program.
  • The average course completion and program completion rate for first-year students will be at least 75%.
  • A job placement rate of 75% within 12 months of graduation.
  • Attrition rates will be reviewed annually and every attempt to keep attrition levels at no more than 30% will be made.

For more information on the profession, please go to the following sites:

Program Accreditation

The Froedtert Hospital DMS Program is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs (www.caahep.org) upon the recommendation of the Joint Review Committee on Education in Diagnostic Medical Sonography.

CAAHEP
9355 - 113th St. N, #7709
Seminole, FL 33775
727-210-2350

Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action/ADA

Admission to the school is open to all qualified individuals. We reaffirm commitment to the principle of equal opportunity regardless of age, race, creed, disability, marital status, sex, national origin, ancestry, sexual orientation, arrest record, conviction record, veteran status or handicap. The program is evaluated continually; reviewed as necessary to keep up with changes in the demands of the profession and to better educate and meet the needs of the students. The program is committed to continuous quality improvement and producing technologists who are an asset to the Allied Health Profession by meeting and exceeding standards set by institutional and accreditation bodies.

JRC-DMS
6021 University Boulevard, Suite 500
Ellicott City, MD 21043
Phone: 443-973-3251
Fax: 866-738-3444
jrcdms.org

Frequently Asked Questions About the Program

Please contact [email protected] if you have any additional questions.

  • You can apply directly via our online Diagnostic Medical Sonography Program application or through a partnered university.

  • You can. You will apply as a “community student.” You must meet all the requirements for application, which does include college-level coursework.

  • If you attend the Froedtert & MCW DMS program through an affiliated university, you will receive credits for your time with us and a degree conveyed by that institution upon graduation. 

    If you attend our program as a “community student” not affiliated with a partner education institution, you will not receive an academic degree. You will be awarded a certificate of program completion and be eligible to take the Abdomen, OB/GYN and Vascular ARDMS registry exams under prerequisite 2.

  • The individual course titles and numbers will vary greatly depending on the education institution you attend. Affiliated schools will have preapproved courses that qualify you for application. For coursework taken outside of partner institutions, please contact program staff. You will be asked to provide unofficial transcripts and potentially syllabi or course descriptions.

  • Froedtert accepts job shadow hours at any location that offers diagnostic medical ultrasounds. Job shadows anywhere can be submitted with the use of a job shadow verification form (filled out by supervising sonographer) or by having the supervising sonographer fill out our downloadable form here. Click here to begin the process of signing up to job shadow at Froedtert & MCW locations.

  • Eight hours of job shadow is sufficient to meet our requirements. We ask that you do your best to observe exams in all areas of our program focus(OB/GYN, abdomen and vascular)if possible.

  • There are many roles that may count for patient care hours but the preferred and most common are: 

    • Certified nursing assistant
    • Medical assistant
    • Emergency medical technician
    • Radiologic technologist 
    • Surgical technologist

    These roles include basic patient care training as part of their education and prerequisites. We also accept patient care hours from a variety of roles including but not limited to: 

    • Patient transport
    • Imaging assistant
    • Exercise physiology 

    If you have questions about a specific role not listed here, you can submit a job description and duty summary to us for review.

  • We strongly suggest a minimum of 100 hours of patient care experience for application. For reference, the median patient care hours of applicants that received an offer in our last cycle (2024) was 514 hours.

  • Applications are accepted from July to January for the following cycle. 

    Interviews are typically held in late February to mid-March.

    Applicants are notified of their offer status shortly after and new cohorts are onboarded over the summer for a late August start date.

  • Applicants not receiving an offer in the first round may be offered a spot on the alternate list. The alternate list will technically remain active until the end of July depending on accepted applicants meeting the onboarding standards. 

    Those that are not offered a spot in the current cohort are welcome to re-apply next fall. This process is done the same way at any application but, on request of the applicant, the program can retain information from previous cycles. The applicant must still submit an application document but certain information, if unchanged, does not need to be resubmitted.

  • There are many ways to improve an application. Scoring is based on (but not necessarily limited to) overall GPA, GPA in prerequisite classes, quality and quantity of patient care experience, personal statement, job shadow hours and candidate interviews. 

    Increasing performance in any of these areas can impact application score.

  • We generally look at 3.0 overall GPA as our cut score for interviews but there are certain scenarios that may impact this. Please contact program staff with further questions.

  • Froedtert Hospital does not award a degree for completion of this program. As such, the program is not eligible for the tuition reimbursement program. There may be reimbursement options within the imaging department. Contact program staff for more details.

  • Our program delivers didactic and clinical education simultaneously and a student should expect to be in either the classroom or at a clinical rotation for nearly 40 hours a week. These hours are overwhelmingly delivered during normal first-shift, business hours (between 7:30 a.m. and 4 p.m.). Exact start and end times will vary with semester and clinical rotation location but, generally, not outside of the first-shift range.