MY BACKGROUND

In 1977 at the age of 14, I watched a short video played by a surgeon visiting the school I attended. The video demonstrated how the surgeon took the patient’s deformed, twisted and useless leg, and through carefully planned bone repositioning straightened the limb, giving the child a chance of learning to walk. This experience later influenced me into choosing a reconstructive surgical career.

My goals were reflected in my training. I started at St James’s University Hospital in Leeds, which was one of the largest microsurgical units in the world. The weekend on-call brought in a steady stream of patients requiring basic limb repair, whilst the position of St James’s as a regional and national centre for microsurgery, brought in patients suffering from severe limb and life-threatening injuries. I started to learn the techniques involved.

My training took me to Aberdeen for two and a half years at a time when farming and the oil industry were booming. Both of these generated severely injured patients with a disturbing regularity. Again I learnt a great deal about tissue structure, salvage and reconstruction.