About Us ::
K & S Associates, Inc. is a privately owned precision calibration laboratory offering a full range of specialized radiation measurement calibrations for medical, nuclear, and industrial applications. K & S Associates also provides medical and health physics consulting services including radiation shielding design, on-site physics services, and specialized analysis services.
Company History
K&S was founded in 1974 by Bob King and Tom Slowey as an organization to provide Medical Physics consultation services. Bob came to Vanderbilt University Medical Center in 1967 having several years experience at Brookhaven National Laboratory as a staff physicist. Bob received his Master of Science degree from Vanderbilt University and was appointed Director of the Division of Physics and Biomedical Engineering of the Department of Radiology in 1970. Tom came to Vanderbit University in 1969 as a junior in an undergraduate engineering program after receiving two years of credit from the University of Tennessee extension in Nashville. Tom was hired by the Division of Radiation Therapy to train as an assistant physicist and to maintain a Varian Clinac 6, a Cobalt 60 unit, a treatment planning computer and a dose scanner. Tom received a BE in electronic engineering from Vanderbilt in 1970 and was appointed Associate Director of the Division of Physics in 1971. Tom and Bob provided consulting services to area institutions and physicians in diagnostic and therapy physics over the period from 1971 to 1974 while members of the faculty and staff of Vanderbilt University Medical School. After K&S was formed in 1974, Bob remained at Vanderbilt while Tom resigned from Vanderbilt and managed the consultation services with two physics technologists and a dosimetrist, Vivian Denton. Vivian trained at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in dosimetry and maintains her registry as a radiologic technologist and as a radiation therapist. Vivian is now Vice President and Quality Manager.
The business started by providing a full range of services including radiological compliance evaluations of diagnostic x-ray units, nuclear medicine services, personnel monitoring, treatment planning services, linear accelerator maintenance, diagnostic and therapy shielding design service, survey meter calibration, calibrations of radiation therapy units and license preparation.
The business grew slowly during the first few years. In 1978, Bob became interested in other business activities and sold his interest in K&S to Tom. By the early 1980's, K&S was serving over 100 institutions in Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama and Mississippi and was providing clinical medical physics and treatment planning consulting services to local area cancer centers.
In October 1981, Victoreen Instrument Company suspended operation as an Accredited Dosimetry Calibration Laboratory (ADCL) accredited by the American Association of Physicist in Medicine (AAPM). ADCL's provide precision radiation instrument calibrations for medical institutions which are directly traceable to the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). This event created a crisis in obtaining medical calibrations since the other two Accredited laboratories - Memorial Sloan Kettering Institute in New York and MD Anderson Cancer Center of the University of Texas in Houston - could not handle the demand for calibration services. In November 1981, K&S decided to design and build a calibration laboratory and apply for AAPM Accreditation. The lab was completed by mid summer of 1982 and was accredited by the AAPM in September of 1982 with Keith Lee, MS as the first Director of the laboratory. Keith left K&S in 1983 to work for a local hospital. Larry Bryson joined the K&S staff in June 1982 and was assigned to the laboratory in November of the same year. Larry received his Associate degree in nuclear technology from Chattanooga State Technical Institute after serving in the US Marine Corp.
In 1987, the K&S AAPM ADCL accreditation was extended to include low dose rate (LDR) brachytherapy and in 1992 accredited high dose rate (HDR) Iridium-192 calibrations of well type chambers was added to the services offerings. Richard Hardison joined K&S in 1987 as a shipping manager. In 1988 he was trained as a survey meter calibration technician and began training to perform brachytherapy. Richard served in the US Army and is a veteran of war in the Vietnam.
Phil Green joined K&S in 1990 as an electronics technician to perform pre-calibration tests on instruments submitted for calibration. Phil received his training in electronics while serving in the US Air Force.
K&S was accredited by the Health Physics Society (HPS)in 1994 to provide radiation survey instrument calibrations for Cesium-137 for rates from 0.5 mR/h to 1000 R/h.
During the same year the diagnostic x-ray dosimeter calibrations were expanded to included diagnostic beams (3 phase, 12 pulse) at diagnostic rates (0.5 to 5 R/s) and extended to mammography with both W/Al and Mo/Mo beams. Noninvasive kVp meter calibrations for both mammography and general radiography were also added during 1994 -1995 by Ed Slowey, who re-joined K&S in September of 1994 after serving over six years in the Nuclear Submarine Service of the US Navy. Ed worked with K&S previously while an undergraduate in physics at Vanderbilt University.
In 1993, Larry Bryson received his BS degree in Physics from University of the State of New York. Larry was Certified in Health Physics by the Health Physics Society in 1996. Larry continued his education with Georgia Tech and received his Master of Science degree in Physics in 1998. Also in 1998, Larry became Associate Director of the K&S ADCL.
Paul Sappenfield joined K&S in 1999. He served in the US Navy as an electronic technician on a nuclear submarine. He currently calibrates therapy and diagnostic dosimetry equipment.
Donnie Hall has provided software services to K&S Associates since 1986. In 2000, Donnie formed Cedar City Group, LLC which provides IT consulting services to companies of all sizes in the Middle Tennessee area.
Ed Slowey was Certified in Health Physics in 1997 and continued his education at Vanderbilt University and Middle Tennessee State University. In 1997 Ed began working under the supervision of Kim Working, MS, DABR in clinical medical physics providing consulting services at three local radiation oncology clinics. In 1998 Ed received his Bachelor of Arts Degree in Physics from Vanderbilt and a Master of Science Degree in Mathematics from MTSU. In 2000, Ed Slowey and Kim Working formed Q.E.D Physics to encompass clinical medical physics services for Radiation Therapy as a separate entity.
K&S currently offers the broadest range of precision calibration and dosimetry services available covering energies from 10 kVp to 250 kVp x-rays, Cesium 137 and Cobalt 60, LDR (Iodine 125, Cesium 137, Iridium 192) and Iridium 192 HDR brachytherapy. K&S offers diagnostic x-ray beam calibrations covering mammography, general radiography and CT and noninvasive kVp meter calibrations over the same range. The newest addition to the services is TLD dosimetry services specializing in diagnostic dose mapping for CV lab and interventional radiology patients using the Poly Dose Belt custom designed by K&S for these procedures. A new apparatus was designed in 1998 to provide the traceability for the NIST dose to water standard which will be available in early 1999 to support the new AAPM requirements under the AAPM Task Group 51 Protocol.
