- Hello, my names Chris Low.
I'm an ENT surgeon and working in Tauranga New Zealand.
ENT stands for ear, nose and throat.
I'm a surgeon and I have been so for the last
15 years or more.
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So a typical day for me would be
either seeing patients in the clinics
or doing operations in the hospital theaters.
So I get to meet on average about
seven or eight patients in half a day
and if I have clinics both in morning and afternoon,
I could probably see around 15 to 20 people sometimes.
So this is my private clinic.
It's very quiet and nice setting.
Very comfortable for patients
when they come and see me here.
My usual tools when I see a patient are one of these.
This is what we call an auriscope or an otoscope.
This is what I use to look into peoples ears
and if I wanted to look into their ears
with a little bit more detail,
I would use a microscope
and I've got a microscope right behind me
and if I want to look into someones nose,
I can use an endoscopic camera that would go up the nose
to have a detailed look inside their nasal cavity.
Some of the problems can be resolved
without having to have surgery
and patients may just need advice
or even medical treatment
and things will settle down for them,
but in our specialty,
most of the problems may require surgery
and then I will talk them through the surgical procedure
that is necessary for them
and I will take them through to another hospital
to have an operation.
So often ENT surgeons are also known as
head and neck surgeons
and some ENT surgeons,
like myself,
we enjoy doing aesthetic surgery
and so we're often known as facial plastic surgeons as well.
So I work in a secondary hospital as well
apart from my private clinics
and a secondary center consultant is quite different
from what they call a tertiary hospital consultant.
Tertiary hospital consultants tend to be
a little bit more specialized
in a smaller area of the ear, nose and throat
because they are a lot more volumes
in a tertiary center hospital
which is usually based in a large city
and so for instance,
an ear, nose and throat surgeon would focus primarily
on ears only or just the nose only
or say just a head and neck cancer only.
So that's what the difference between
a tertiary center consultant
as opposed to a secondary hospital consultant like myself,
which I would sill do quite a lot more general things.
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So here we are and this is the operating theater
I normally work in.
In an operating theater you've got to have enough space.
It's quite spacious here.
They've got good lights and a very, very good
strong operating table where the patients would lie on.
In an operating theater,
you will also find an unaesthetic machine
and that's the machine that my nurse anesthetists
would put patients at ease and put them to sleep
very, very soundly
and so they keep very still for the operation.
So at the age of 17 or 18
I went onto University of Dundee
and that's where I started my medical school.
It's a fantastic medical school
and I've enjoyed all the activities
that they provided there in my training.
Approximately when I'm in my mid-twenties
I did my first job as an ENT Junior Doctor
and I found that this specialty suited me
in terms of the technical abilities.
They tend to use a lot of gadgets and technology
and they have to utilize very, very innovative
and clever ways of looking into areas where it's difficult.
The type of surgery that's performed
for ear, nose and throat
tend to be very delicate type surgery
so it suited my personality and my abilities,
but more importantly there was a group of ENT surgeons
who kind of inspired me to get into this specialty.
So it's very important to have
your interests, enthusiasm
and having mentorship to kind of inspire you
into doing something
because that's gonna be something you're gonna be doing
for the rest of your life.
So getting into a medical career is really exciting,
but there are some things if you don't have an insight
because you've not come from a medical background
you'll be quite surprised once you get into it
there are some things that can be quite difficult.
For instance, we work long hours
and we have to be quite committed
and we often have to sacrifice a lot of things
to stay on course.
Medical career can be quite a selfish career
and you have to stay very focused,
but what really keeps me going
is at the end of the day
when you see your patients being treated
and they are very happy, grateful and thankful to you.
That brings me a lot of joy.
Sometimes I get the occasional letters
of compliment and thanks.
These are the kinds of things that keeps me going
when I encounter some difficult challenges.
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Hi.
Here we are in part of Tauranga that's close to my home.
This is called The Lakes
because there's a lake behind me.
It's an awesome place to relax
and to unwind and you can even do activities like kayaking.
I know what you're thinking.
Surgeon, great lifestyle,
living in nice,
beautiful part of the country, having it all.
Yes we have reason to be comfortable,
reason to be well paid,
but that's not the only reason that you should be thinking
of if you want to choose medicine
and moving forward,
if you intend to go into medicine,
you should think about your abilities
to demonstrate empathy.
You should think about having some real insights
as to what the job entails
because those are the real attributes that will help you
see you through your career and be very, very successful
in your career.
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