“I’m a doctor in the Emergency Department at Scarborough Hospital.

“I have been in the region since 2010 when I first started my training at the Hull York Medical School, and since qualifying in 2015 I’ve worked for the Trust in a number of different areas.  I’m from the South East and didn’t plan on living and working here, but I really like it and so haven’t got round to leaving yet!

“I can’t pinpoint exactly when I decided I wanted to be a doctor, but certainly when it came to applying for university, there wasn’t another course I wanted to do, or even considered if I’m being honest, so I guess that’s when I realised that medicine was the thing for me.

“For me, the Emergency Department showcases that fundamental tenet of the NHS, universal access to healthcare that is free at the point of delivery.  Whoever you are, whatever problem you have, whether it is day or night, we will do our utmost to fix it.

“I really do love my job and one of the best bits is the randomness, the unpredictability, the variety.  I can be with a five-year old who has asthma, then see someone in their sixties having a heart attack who needs to be transferred to Hull for emergency treatment, then put someone’s shoulder back into place after they’ve dislocated it whilst out mountain biking, before admitting an elderly person with a chest infection who can’t cope at home and then stitch up a cut on a rugby player’s head…and all before lunch - if I get it!

“I’m at the start of my career in the health service, but even in the short time that I’ve been working I’ve seen it get much busier.  There are more and more people needing to be seen.  Sometimes I wonder how many of them would be in the waiting room if the NHS didn’t exist as it does.  Partly because some of them really don’t need to be there but more because I suspect that there are a lot of people who simply wouldn’t be around today without the care the NHS has given them over past seventy years.

“The best bit of advice I’ve been given is called the ‘grandma rule’.  The essence of it is to treat everyone like they’re your grandma.  If you wouldn’t do it - for example an investigation, treatment or procedure - to your grandma, then do you really need to do it at all?  This really makes me think about the investigations that I do, especially in the emergency department, and whether they have a meaningful impact on a patient’s journey.”