Closing the Gap

Closing the Gap

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We welcome 35 new medical trainees

We welcome 35 new medical trainees

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Pathology medical trainees are the future of our medical workforce and a crucial part of our organisation. 

There is a short­age of spe­cial­ist pathol­o­gists inter­na­tion­al­ly and across Aus­tralia and we are work­ing with NSW Health and the Roy­al Col­lege of Pathol­o­gists of Aus­trala­sia (RCPA) to recruit, train and retain the next gen­er­a­tion in all dis­ci­plines. 

Thir­ty-five new med­ical trainees began the new clin­i­cal year with us on 5 Feb­ru­ary 2024.

We have 22 in Anatom­i­cal Pathol­o­gy with 8 work­ing in region­al cen­tres at Tam­worth, Orange, Wag­ga Wag­ga and for the first time in Coffs Har­bour. In our met­ro­pol­i­tan lab­o­ra­to­ries, we have new trainees work­ing across Foren­sics (1), Immunopathol­o­gy (2), Chem­i­cal Pathol­o­gy (3), Micro­bi­ol­o­gy (7) and AP (14) at New­cas­tle, Gos­ford, Wol­lon­gong, Nepean, Roy­al Prince Alfred, West­mead, Con­cord, Liv­er­pool, St George, Prince of Wales and Roy­al North Shore.

In ear­ly Feb­ru­ary, our new Micro­bi­ol­o­gy and AP trainees attend­ed ori­en­ta­tion at the Roy­al Col­lege of Pathol­o­gists of Aus­trala­sia (RCPA) at Sur­ry Hills, the NSW Min­istry of Health at St Leonards, as well as tour­ing the Foren­sic Med­i­cine and Coro­ners Court Com­plex (FMCCC) at Lid­combe and vis­it­ing a pri­vate laboratory.

FM e1707968062304
New trainees dur­ing a vis­it to the FMCCC, Lidcombe

They heard pre­sen­ta­tions from NSWHP’s Med­ical Work­force team, senior trainees and RCPA Chief Exec­u­tive Offi­cer, Dr Debra Graves. Our Direc­tor of Clin­i­cal Oper­a­tions, Met­ro­pol­i­tan, Dr Louise Wien­holt, and Human Resources Man­ag­er Laila Has­san, also presented.

New AP trainees Kate and Hamish
New AP trainees Hamish Carmichael (West­mead) and Kate Osborne (Coffs Harbour).

The NSW Pathol­o­gy Train­ing Pro­gram, run by NSWHP and the RCPA, is one of the most rig­or­ous in Aus­tralia. It takes 5 years to qual­i­fy for RCPA Fel­low­ship, with a strong empha­sis on aca­d­e­m­ic and prac­ti­cal learning.

We employ approx­i­mate­ly 120 junior doc­tors each year in trainee/registrar posi­tions across NSW, most­ly in Anatom­i­cal Pathology.

We’re also sup­port­ing exist­ing trainees in Haema­tol­ogy and Genet­ic Pathol­o­gy in their pro­gres­sion towards Fellowship.

AP trainees
Jor­dan Wiebe (West­mead) and Erwin­preet Kaur (Wol­lon­gong).

Jor­dan Wiebe hails from Edmon­ton in Cana­da and is hap­py to be in Syd­ney despite (or because of?) the hot sum­mer! Erwin­preet Kaur enjoyed an Res­i­dent Med­ical Offi­cer (RMO) term in pathol­o­gy at Wol­lon­gong Hos­pi­tal before join­ing us as an AP trainee. She was inspired by the ‘Bernie fac­tor’: Dr Bernie l’Ons, a Spe­cial­ist Foren­sic and Anatom­i­cal Pathol­o­gist with our Foren­sic Med­i­cine Wol­lon­gong service.

Chang
New AP trainees Kevin Du (Gos­ford) and Will Chang (Wag­ga Wagga).

We’re so pleased to see the enthu­si­asm of our new trainees. Will Chang (pic­tured above) is the broth­er of Michael Chang who start­ed with us last year as a Foren­sic trainee. We’d love to hear their fam­i­ly con­ver­sa­tions about who has the best job!

Supriya Pradham (Coffs Harbour) and Maria Nguyen (St George)
Supriya Prad­ham (Coffs Har­bour) and Maria Nguyen (St George)

Seniors

Thank you also to senior AP trainees Alice Ormandy, St George Hos­pi­tal, and Alexan­der van laar Veth, St Vin­cents Hos­pi­tal (pic­tured above) for their pre­sen­ta­tions to the new trainees.

Three women and two men pose smiling at the camera while attending an event.
AP Train­ing Coor­di­na­tor Dr Lisa Park­er with RCPA Edu­ca­tion Offi­cer Kathy Robin­son, NSWHP Med­ical Work­force Man­ag­er Sam Veasey, Chief Pathol­o­gist and Direc­tor of Med­ical Ser­vices Dr Michael Whiley, and Med­ical Work­force Team Leader Joyce Wu.

Celebrating women’s impact in science: Prof Ruta Gupta’s story

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In honour of International Day of Women and Girls in Science, we’re shining a light on Professor Ruta Gupta and her incredible journey in medicine and science.

Pro­fes­sor Gup­ta, a Senior Staff Spe­cial­ist in NSW Health Pathol­o­gy, is the Clin­i­cal Direc­tor of the Depart­ment of Tis­sue Pathol­o­gy and Diag­nos­tic Oncol­o­gy at Roy­al Prince Alfred Hos­pi­tal in Syd­ney. Her exper­tise lies in the com­plex realm of head and neck can­cers, where her work extends far beyond diagnosis.

Anatom­i­cal Pathol­o­gists like Pro­fes­sor Gup­ta are med­ical doc­tors who exam­ine tis­sues to diag­nose dis­ease, pre­dict how dis­eases will progress and guide treat­ment plans cru­cial for patient man­age­ment. As a part of her work in head and neck can­cer, she is advo­cat­ing for HPV vac­cines for both boys and girls to pre­vent ton­sil can­cer. She is influ­enc­ing inter­na­tion­al med­ical prac­tices through her work devel­op­ing guide­lines used glob­al­ly for diag­nos­ing and report­ing head and neck cancer.

But her impact does not stop there. Last year NHMRC announced fund­ing for 14 new cen­tres of research excel­lence focus­ing on health issues of pro­found sig­nif­i­cance for patients and com­mu­ni­ties with a total invest­ment of $35 mil­lion. Pro­fes­sor Gup­ta is one of the chief inves­ti­ga­tors on the Cen­tre of Research Excel­lence to reduce mor­bid­i­ty of oral can­cer along with head and neck sur­geons, med­ical oncol­o­gists, cell biol­o­gists, bio­med­ical engi­neers and math­e­mati­cians. We wish this mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary team tak­ing on this ground­break­ing chal­lenge every suc­cess in their efforts.

Through her ded­i­ca­tion and inno­v­a­tive spir­it, Pro­fes­sor Ruta Gup­ta serves as an inspi­ra­tion for aspir­ing doc­tors and sci­en­tists – espe­cial­ly women and girls – to pur­sue their pas­sion for sci­en­tif­ic explo­ration and con­tribute to shap­ing a health­i­er, brighter future for all.

Fighting cancer by day, taking on Gladiators by night

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Janice Sideroudakis is our senior hospital scientist managing the Cytology Laboratory at Nepean Hospital. But in her spare time, she’s been taking on Gladiators in the Channel Ten revival of the popular TV show.

Cytol­ogy involves diag­nos­ing patients’ cells under the micro­scope and is main­ly used to screen for cancer.

Jan­ice describes her job at the Nepean Lab­o­ra­to­ry as incred­i­bly rewarding.

“I’m look­ing for indi­ca­tions as to whether it’s a benign or malig­nant process. This work ulti­mate­ly dic­tates a patient’s treat­ment and care plan, and hope­ful­ly gets them well soon­er,” she says.

“I love col­lab­o­rat­ing with fel­low sci­en­tists, pathol­o­gists, radi­og­ra­phers, radi­ol­o­gists and the med­ical care team to ensure our patients receive the best care possible.

“Also, our pathol­o­gy team here at Nepean Hos­pi­tal, from the most senior to junior roles, are just an amaz­ing bunch of peo­ple, which makes com­ing to work joy­ful and fun, despite our seri­ous jobs.”

A woman sits at a desk looking through a microscope with a cytology textbook on the table.
Jan­ice Sider­oudakis helps doc­tors diag­nose and treat can­cer as head of the cytol­ogy lab­o­ra­to­ry at Nepean Hospital.

So what got Jan­ice onto a show like Gladiators?

She watched the show as a teenag­er and even got to meet one of the orig­i­nal Glad­i­a­tors – her favourite, Vul­can – at a shop­ping centre.

“My eldest daugh­ter, Sama­ra (10 years old), encour­aged me to try out as she real­ly believes in my fit­ness and thought I would do well,” Jan­ice explains.

“I have also been in pre­vi­ous real­i­ty TV fit­ness com­pe­ti­tions like lead­ing the 3‑person team in “Spar­tan” in 2018 and a game of chase in “Ulti­mate Tag” in 2021.

“Although, I did not progress past round 2 in those com­pe­ti­tions, due to injuries and pres­sure, they were both a lot of fun and a great expe­ri­ence. Com­ing to do a third real­i­ty TV fit­ness com­pe­ti­tion, I thought I would just enjoy it, try my best and have fun, as I am get­ting old­er, and it may be the last time I will ever be select­ed for such a competition.”

We’re not so sure about that – Jan­ice made it all the way to the grand final of Glad­i­a­tors and was lead­ing the final race when she fell and was over­tak­en by her rival contender.

A woman wearing gym gear yells while a flame shoots up beside her.
Jan­ice came very close to win­ning this year’s revival of the Glad­i­a­tors TV show.

She was one of the small­est con­tenders on the show – but at 42 is incred­i­bly fit. We asked Jan­ice what she does to keep in shape.

“I exer­cise 6 days a week, with half an hour of car­dio to warm up. Always skip­ping rope with a mix­ture of run­ning, row­ing and cycling pri­or to doing heavy weights and fin­ish­ing off with Cross­Fit or high-inten­si­ty work­outs. I have just recent­ly gone back to Jiu­jit­su again 3 times a week as well.

“I am a high­ly ener­getic per­son and love to train hard and burn all that excess ener­gy. Many peo­ple who see me train­ing for the first time have always asked what com­pe­ti­tion I am train­ing for as they’ve nev­er real­ly seen some­one go as hard, every sin­gle time.”

At the end of the Glad­i­a­tors grand finale, Jan­ice was joined by her daugh­ters and hus­band. She says the sup­port of her fam­i­ly is key.

“My fam­i­ly are my biggest fans and sup­port group and just love see­ing me com­pete gen­er­al­ly but are so proud for me to have been select­ed in this re-make of Gladiators.”

As for new chal­lenges, Jan­ice doesn’t plan to slow down any­time soon.

She says hav­ing knee surgery just over a year ago allowed her some down­time to con­cen­trate on com­plet­ing her Mas­ters in Health Ser­vice Man­age­ment, which is she is just about to finish.

She’s also deter­mined to gen­er­ate more inter­est in cytology.

“Cytol­ogy is a very niche pro­fes­sion and I plan to teach more stu­dents our craft and sup­port emerg­ing cytol­ogy scientists.”

Pathologist and infectious diseases expert makes Australia Day honours list

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Dr Matthew O’Sullivan AM from our Westmead laboratory has been appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for services to medicine.

He was involved in treat­ing some of the first COVID-19 patients in Aus­tralia and has now been hon­oured for his years of work in the field of infec­tious diseases.

Dr O’Sullivan is the Super­vis­ing Pathol­o­gist at our Micro­bi­ol­o­gy Lab­o­ra­to­ry at West­mead Hos­pi­tal, where he is also Head of the Depart­ment of Infec­tious Diseases.

He has a clin­i­cal inter­est in staphy­lo­coc­cal infec­tion, trop­i­cal med­i­cine, HIV, infec­tions in immuno­com­pro­mised hosts and diag­no­sis, and in the man­age­ment and clin­i­cal bio­con­tain­ment of infec­tious dis­eases, such as Ebo­la and COVID-19.

His research inter­est is in geno­typed-based sur­veil­lance of pathogens respon­si­ble for hos­pi­tal-acquired infections.

A man working in a laboratory.
Dr Matthew O’Sul­li­van at work in the lab.

In ear­ly 2020 at the start of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, Dr O’Sullivan trav­elled to Christ­mas Island to help man­age 278 Aus­tralians who were quar­an­tined there.

“We did a rapid assess­ment of every evac­uee as they arrived and iden­ti­fied those who need­ed fur­ther test­ing,” Dr O’Sullivan said.

“We actu­al­ly set up a lab­o­ra­to­ry on the island, which was a major achieve­ment and sup­port­ed the whole operation.

“That meant we could do the pri­ma­ry test­ing there and have results with­in hours, rather than a three-day wait if we need­ed to send them to the mainland.

“We also did check-ups every day, but a lot of our work became keep­ing peo­ple occu­pied and enter­tained for the two weeks of isolation.”

We’re proud to have you on our team Dr O’Sullivan, con­grat­u­la­tions on this well-deserved honour!

A man stands with his arms crossed in front of shelves filled with equipment.
Dr O’Sul­li­van was part of the team that went to Christ­mas Island at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

World leading pathologist and oncologist named joint Australians of the Year

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NSW Health Pathology’s Professor Richard Scolyer AO and his colleague, oncologist Professor Georgina Long AO, have been named joint 2024 Australians of the Year.

Two Aus­tralians chang­ing the world for the better!

We’d like to con­grat­u­late our very own world-renowned melanoma pathol­o­gist Pro­fes­sor Richard Scoly­er AO and his col­league, oncol­o­gist Pro­fes­sor Georgina Long AO, on being named 2024 Aus­tralians of the Year.

Prof Scoly­er is NSW Health Pathology’s Senior Staff Spe­cial­ist in Tis­sue Pathol­o­gy and Diag­nos­tic Oncol­o­gy at the Roy­al Prince Alfred Hos­pi­tal and he and Prof Long are Co-Med­ical Direc­tors at Melanoma Insti­tute Australia.

Their endur­ing part­ner­ship has saved thou­sands of lives from melanoma, known as Aus­trali­a’s nation­al cancer.

Less than a decade ago, advanced melanoma was fatal – but thanks to Richard and Georgina’s immunother­a­py approach, which acti­vates a patient’s own immune sys­tem, it has become a cur­able disease.

Prime Min­is­ter Antho­ny Albanese pre­sent­ed the pair with the award on 25 Jan­u­ary 2024 at a cer­e­mo­ny in Canberra.

In their accep­tance speech they both called for more work to be done to address ris­ing rates of melanoma.

A man and a woman holding trophies stand in front of the Sydney Harbour bridge at night.
Georgina and Richard in Sydney.

“There is noth­ing healthy about a tan. Noth­ing,” Pro­fes­sor Long told the gathering.

“Our bronzed Aussie cul­ture is actu­al­ly killing us.

“So, we call on adver­tis­ers and social media influ­encers – stop glam­or­is­ing tan­ning,” she said.

They also spoke about Richard’s own brain can­cer jour­ney and his deci­sion to put him­self for­ward for an exper­i­men­tal treat­ment program.

In June 2023, when Richard was diag­nosed with incur­able grade 4 brain can­cer, he and Georgina devel­oped a series of world-first treat­ments based on their melanoma breakthroughs.

Richard became the world’s first brain can­cer patient to have pre-surgery com­bi­na­tion immunotherapy.

A man lying in a hospital bed, with the side of his head bandaged, smiling.
Richard Scoyler just after under­go­ing his surgery at Roy­al Prince Alfred Hospital.

By under­tak­ing an exper­i­men­tal treat­ment with the risk of short­en­ing his life, he has advanced the under­stand­ing of brain can­cer and is ben­e­fit­ing future patients.

“I stand here tonight as a ter­mi­nal brain can­cer patient. I’m only 57. I don’t want to die. I love my life, my fam­i­ly, my work. I’ve so much more to do and to give,” Pro­fes­sor Scoly­er said after receiv­ing the award.

“I’m one of the many thou­sands of can­cer patients who’ve trav­elled this path, and thou­sands will follow.

“Devis­ing this world-first exper­i­men­tal treat­ment for my type of brain can­cer was bold and for me, the deci­sion to take on Georgina’s ground-break­ing plan was a no-brainer.

“Here was an oppor­tu­ni­ty for us to crack anoth­er incur­able can­cer and make a dif­fer­ence – if not for me, then for others.”

We wish him all the best on his treat­ment jour­ney and as 2024 Aus­tralian of the Year!

Farewell to Louise Moonen after 40 fabulous years in healthcare!

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Immunology Technical Assistant at NSW Health Pathology’s Newcastle laboratory, Louise Moonen, looks back on her career which began in nursing in the 1980s.

Louise began her train­ing as an enrolled nurse in 1982 at St Joseph’s Home Sandgate on the west­ern out­skirts of Newcastle.

“This was a teach­ing hos­pi­tal back in the day, tak­ing in 25 or so appli­cants every year,” she said.

“Being trained by the nuns, who were very strict but com­pas­sion­ate, I believe made us bet­ter and more car­ing nurses.”

Louise then worked as an Occu­pa­tion­al Ther­a­py Tech­ni­cal Assis­tant from 1990 to 1996 and from there moved into pathol­o­gy, work­ing as a tech­ni­cal assis­tant from 1996 to 2023.

She admits her move into pathol­o­gy was quite accidental.

“In 1995 St Joseph’s was to be tak­en over by the Fed­er­al Gov­ern­ment and those who want­ed to retain their ben­e­fits were to be re-employed in sim­i­lar posi­tions at the var­i­ous pub­lic hos­pi­tals in the Hunter.

“Pathol­o­gy was picked for me so off I went.

“It was very daunt­ing at first as there was so much to learn and retain and I need­ed to train at three dif­fer­ent hos­pi­tals – the John Hunter Hos­pi­tal, the Mater and the Roy­al New­cas­tle Hos­pi­tal where I was to be employed.

“The best times of my career were at ‘The Roy­al’ as I’m sure every­one who worked there in the 80s and 90s would agree.

“The lab was small­er, and we were a very close-knit group. Plus, we got to look out at those mil­lion-dol­lar ocean views!”

Since the birth of her son in 1999, Louise has been work­ing in the lab­o­ra­to­ry two days a week, so she’s con­fi­dent she’ll adjust to retired life.

“I’ll have anoth­er day to go to the gym or catch up with friends for cof­fee. Maybe I’ll take up golf and join my hus­band on the course. Trav­el to Cana­da and Croa­t­ia are on our wish list as well,” she says.

“It goes with­out say­ing I will miss my work­mates and the ban­ter and laughs often at my expense!! When you work with col­leagues for a long time they become like fam­i­ly, and you share each oth­er’s joys and sor­rows. No one will call me ‘Lady Louise’ at home like they do in Immunology!”

You will be missed just as much by your col­leagues, Louise – we wish you every hap­pi­ness in retirement!

 

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NSW Health Pathology acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the land across NSW whose cultures and customs have nurtured and continue to nurture this land. We would like to pay our respects to the Elders past, present and emerging, for they hold the memories, the traditions, the culture and hopes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples across the state.

Aboriginal Workforce Development Closing the Gap

NSW Health Pathology acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the land across NSW whose cultures and customs have nurtured and continue to nurture this land. We would like to pay our respects to the Elders past, present and emerging, for they hold the memories, the traditions, the culture and hopes of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples across the state.

Aboriginal Workforce Development Closing the Gap
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