Profile

I played a lot of sport when I was younger including cricket, skiing and running. I still try and run everyday now but it gets harder as you get older, so I’m doing more and more cycling.

I’ve always gone to lots of gigs but unfortunately not many big bands come to Aberdeen now so it often means trips to Glasgow or Edinburgh. Have seen many great shows but the best ever were probably Rush on their R30 tour or Iron Maiden a couple of years ago.

I enjoy the teaching aspect of my job so have done many outreach activities to try and show kids that there are many wonderful careers in health that aren’t doctors or nurses. Most careers services know very little about these, so it’s important to get the message out there.

Most medical imaging techniques like CT or MRI give accurate images of what the body looks like but they tell us nothing about how well organ systems are working. Nuclear Medicine, where I work, is unique as we can answer those questions about how the body is working.

We inject patients with small amounts of radioactive tracers which allow us to image different areas of the body depending on the tracer used. We make the patient the radioactive source so we have to take precautions around that until the radiation decays away, generally by the next day.

We can also treat certain cancers and other diseases by injecting patients with different types of radiation which kill the diseased cells directly. This is a huge growth area and there is going to be a lot of development and expansion in this area over the next 10 years.

At work I make sure the patients have all the right images taken and then write the report on what the images show which goes back to the doctor who asked for the test. I’m also responsible for making sure we follow all the rules about handling radiation and making sure all the staff and patients don’t get any more radiation exposure than is safe and needed.

We also do lots of research which is really interesting and it’s good to know you’re helping develop new ways of helping people who are ill. I also teach students who are doing masters courses and PhDs in medical imaging which can be rewarding.