George has had an extraordinary career in science and pathology that has taken him all over the world and across much of Australia. Now at the age of 77, George says he still has plenty left to give to the community when it comes to healthcare.

What do you do and why does it matter?

I am a med­ical lab­o­ra­to­ry sci­en­tist and I cov­er the areas of haema­tol­ogy, bio­chem­istry, blood bank and micro­bi­ol­o­gy at the Kempsey Dis­trict Hos­pi­tal pathol­o­gy laboratory.
I am also part of the overnight ros­tered on call ser­vice, work­ing between the hours of 9:00pm and 8:00am. My role also includes instru­ment qual­i­ty con­trol, main­te­nance sched­ules and trou­ble shooting.

Pathol­o­gy is such an impor­tant part of patient care, as it helps to guide doc­tors to the cor­rect diag­no­sis and treatment.

Tell us about your scientific career path and what inspired you to work in pathology?

I start­ed off as a trainee at the Roy­al Wom­en’s Hos­pi­tal in Mel­bourne and then com­plet­ed my train­ing at the Roy­al Mel­bourne Hos­pi­tal in 1974.
I then worked as a vol­un­teer in rur­al Bangladesh at Gonoshasthaya Kendra (Peo­ples Health Cen­tre) from 1975 to 1977, where I trained young vil­lagers, both male and female, in basic pathol­o­gy lab­o­ra­to­ry skills and par­tic­i­pat­ed in grow­ing some of our own food by work­ing in the pad­dy fields, plant­i­ng, weed­ing and har­vest­ing rice, while avoid­ing being bit­ten by snakes.

After return­ing to Aus­tralia, I joined a pri­vate pathol­o­gy firm in Bris­bane. They were just at the stage of set­ting up coun­try lab­o­ra­to­ries so after about 2 years I was asked to start a lab­o­ra­to­ry in Lis­more and I worked there until June 2008, when I retired.

Dur­ing my retire­ment, I went to Zim­bab­we to help the Mazivisa pri­ma­ry school in cen­tral Zimab­we with gifts of food, cloth­ing and school repairs.

My career path then led to my cur­rent posi­tion with NSW Health Pathol­o­gy in Kempsey, where I have now worked for the past 12 years.

A proud moment or interesting case?

There was a shark attack at Cres­cent Head in 2022. Our Kempsey blood bank staff had to sup­ply blood prod­ucts very quick­ly to save the life of the surfer, who thank­ful­ly survived.

What do you like to do to unwind outside of work?

I like to read books such as biogra­phies, his­tor­i­cal nov­els, swim and walk at Port Mac­quar­ie, trav­el to places I have not been to before, such as a trip to Antarc­ti­ca on a Russ­ian ice break­er, with a few oth­er intre­pid adventurers.

I have also writ­ten 3 books:
1. My Walk on the Wild­side. A Jour­ney to Africa that Changed my Life
2. Twen­ty Spec­tac­u­lar Water­falls from Around the World: Twen­ty must see water­falls before you leave the world
3. The Ulti­mate Anti-Inflam­ma­to­ry Diet for Begin­ners: Learn How to Boost Ener­gy, Lose Weight , Improve Diges­tion and Sleep Bet­ter to Achieve Opti­mal Health

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