How do you describe your job when you meet people at a party?
I tell people I’m primarily involved in cancer screening, which they generally find interesting and want to find out more.
What is ‘cutting-edge’ about your work?
The cutting edge science in my field is the use and development of new technology as well as recent advances in molecular biology. Our understanding of cervical cancer is improving all the time. The molecular events that trigger cancer are becoming clearer. We’ve always used morphology as a way of diagnosing cancer (i.e. the size of a cell nucleus, how darkly it stains). This is basic science which has been in place for 70-80 years but now we’re starting to better understand the biological events underpinning it. Modern technology will help us to better understand those events. There’s a phrase I tell my colleagues which they thinks nicely sums things up: “Cytology is a simple morphological representation of a complex biological process.”
What are the biggest implications your work will/could have in the future?
In an ideal world a screening programme would eliminate the disease it was screening for. In practice, however, this is not possible: not everyone will participate and the test is never going to be perfect. But through screening we have seen a massive reduction in cervical cancer, which has fallen to the 12th most common cancer for women in the UK. In the world, it’s the 2rd or 3rd most common cancer for women, which is primarily due to third world countries and the lack of screening.
Describe some of the highlights of your average day.
I get the most pleasure in the fact that we’re relying on a simple morphological appearance [of a sample] to diagnose a complex disease….some of the satisfaction comes from being right about our diagnoses. We’re using years of experience to judge morphological appearances that can be complex and coming up with the right answer based on relatively little information.
Describe briefly how your career has progressed to date.
I always knew I wanted to do science; I was strongest in science at school. I came straight into the NHS after school (didn’t go to university), but I’ve now done the qualifications I need for vocational use. I’ve always worked for the NHS, except for three months after I left school counting freshwater invertebrates! My work has always focused on cellular pathology, or the study of disease in tissue and cells. In cytology the roles for non-medical staff have increased in recent years as well as the need for medically qualified consultant pathologists (my level). There have been a lot of obstacles along the way, and I’m really pleased we’ve finally achieved this.
How is your job cross-disciplinary?
I sit here in a lab but I have strong clinical interfaces with colleagues in both gynecology and colposcopy. The way in which my colleagues treat their female patients is often determined by the information we give them based on cellular appearances. We have meetings to discuss patients where we view slides and have both clinical and cytological presentations before agreeing on a plan of management for that patient
What’s the most unexpected thing about your job?
I think what would surprise other people is the level at which we work and what we’re actually able to achieve based on the samples that come into the department. They’re relatively simple samples but the information we can get from them is often quite high-level. That will only increase as we use more and more modern molecular biology techniques
What’s the biggest achievement of your career so far?
Passing the conjoint examination that got me to this level in my career
