A standard day is based around working in different parts of the department, depending
where you are listed to. I spend most of my time in General, so I spend a lot of time
working with different patients. You're with them only for a short period of time, between
5 and 15 minutes with each patient. You're trying to get the best diagnostic images that
you can, you're trying to help the patient out as best you can.
For me it's the mix between technology and working with people. I learnt early on that I
don't want to be stuck in an office, I don't want to sit behind a desk, I don't want to
be stuck in one place very static, in this job I get to move around- I walk about 6 miles
a day.
Fortunately my father did. He reminds me every time I see him that it was his idea. Radiography
caught my eye and that's when I noticed it, and lead down this path.
Initially I worked as a shipping clerk, so sort of as an office junior really, playing
with lots of giant files and dealing with boats. I got the chance to go to China doing
that, so I worked in China for about 6 months in Shanghai, which was great, but I quickly
realised I didn't want to sit behind that desk. I was really fed up with that. So I
came back, tried my hand at Air Traffic Controlling, I did that, that's amazingly stressful so
I decided to stay well away from that. That's when my father pointed me this out to me and
I ended up in university doing this.
I went to university to do a Radiographic and Diagnostic Imaging degree, which is 3
years long, in the UK. After that I can work essentially doing what I do. Since then I've
done several different qualifications, I've done postgraduate qualifications in Forensic
Radiography and Reporting Radiography so I can look at x-rays and determine what's going
on in them, to see if there is broken bones and so forth.
I did the standard Maths, English, English Lit, Science, it was two sciences at the time
you had to do. I did Food Technology because I like to cook food, because I like to eat
it and then I did Drama because it was there and something to do and I didn't want to do
Sports Studies because I hate PE.
Communication, you've got to be able to talk to people and you have to talk to people of
all levels so you have to be able to talk to an adult in a certain way as a patient
or talk to a doctor in a certain way, and then you have to be able to communicate with
children as well, try to get them to relax and calm down as quick as you can so you can
get a good x-ray of them without stressing them out.
You need a good sense of spatial awareness, not in a sense of what's around you at the
moment, but the idea of looking at a 2D image and imagining it in a 3D space, and how that
works especially looking at x-rays, imagining how that sort of transforms into a persons
body.
I love the fact that I'm not sitting behind a desk, that I'm meeting different people. I get
to play with big toys like this and I get to see what they can do.
It's just the scope, the size of it, there is just so much you can do and I can work
anywhere in the world to do it. There is always demand for Radiographers, there will be endless
demand for us, there is always work to do somewhere.
Getting my postgraduate in Reporting Radiography was quite big for me, just because it was
a lot of work and it was the thought of going back to university again that I didn't want
to do. But I got through that which was quite good.
Yeah they all think I'm a nurse for some reason, I don't know why. Although some people see
you, and because they see a man, they think you're automatically a doctor, but because
I look like a nurse essentially, they all call me nurse and it's sort of a misconception
of what radiographers do and what they are and even what the term means.
I'd say consider the pressure and the stress. Make sure you're happy with that sort of idea
and you can deal with that on a day to day basis. It can be long hours, we work days,
nights, a 24 hour system basically, so you can work 12-15 hour shifts. There are still some places
in the UK working 21 hour shifts I believe.
It was the going back to university, that was the first thing for me just trying to
get back into the mindset of sitting in lectures, listening to someone talk to me and then going
home and writing an essay, which I wasn't too happy about at first. But I got through that.
Then the Honoraries with my first forensic case when they lead you into a dark mortuary and a dead body and
tell you to get on with it, so that was a bit challenging at first but again your professionalism
kicks in and you sort of get used to it and your training kicks in.
Tough things will come along everyday at work and at home, try not to let them stress you
out too much because it never helps.
It's a good lifestyle really I suppose, I can't complain. I don't worry about when the
next paycheck is coming which is always good, I know I'm always going to have work and I'm
never going to run out of work.
There are loads of radiographers I know that work over in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore,
there's a lot of jobs in the Middle East- you can go anywhere you want to with it.
My wife makes me smile, and probably my two greyhounds when they go a bit loopy on the
beach.