Podcast episode 4, Dr. Anita Moss and Ryan Kevelighan
10 Sep 2024
Dr. Anita Moss has been working as a GP Obstetrician for 23 years. She currently has two clinical lead roles in Victoria and is a non-executive director on the board of SANE.
Having recovered from mental ill health, she was inspired to share her lived experience and learnings with others, in the hope that people who are suffering will access support and health.
Tune in as Dr. Anita Moss shares her journey on how she developed the SAST workshops for medical students and doctors to increase their self-awareness and emotional intelligence skills to better cope with stress.
In this episode, we cover the following topics:
- An overview of Dr. Anita Moss’s working experiences as a GP Obstetrician, locum doctor, and non-executive director of SANE
- How mental health is an important topic that’s often overlooked
- Anita’s lived experience of mental ill health and her recovery
- Her journey of creating and developing the SAST workshops
- What can doctors and medical students expect from the course?
For more information and to book the SAST course, click here:
Self Awareness Skills Training Workshop
1Medical doctors, if you are interested in being featured in our next podcast, please contact Ryan Kevelighan on ryan@1medical.com.au.
Click here to read the full transcript
Full Transcript
[00:00:00] Ryan:
Hello everyone. Welcome today. It’s another episode of our podcast with 1Medical, 1 in Focus, and I’m really excited to be sat here today with the lovely Dr. Anita Moss, who landed into our office this morning here in Sydney, fresh off the plane from Melbourne, I believe, last night is where she flew in from.
And Anita, we’re here today to talk mainly about your passion project, which is your Self-Awareness Skills Training course, which was designed by yourself for doctors to help them with their own self-awareness around multiple areas. Including their own mental health, and we know that mental health is a very important topic that’s often overlooked.
Just a quick brief intro on yourself before I hand over to you to a more in-depth intro. So, you’re a fellow GP obstetrician, qualified in Western Australia, and I believe you’ve worked in many places, and you are now based in Victoria. We, as 1Medical have had the pleasure of working with you as a locum, but unfortunately not that much because you are a lady with many, many fingers in many pies, as they say, as you are the advocate for the College of Obstetricians, well-being, and non-exec director of the SANE peer ambassador program, and of course the facilitator of your own course, which we’re here to talk about.
So, would you like to give us a more detailed overview of yourself and your background and your career, Anita?
[00:01:14] Anita:
Yeah. Sure. Ryan, thank you so much for having me. I’m delighted to be here and I’m really thrilled that you’re 1Medical have been supporting this program since, uh, you heard about it at the end of last year, uh, when I did my locum in Ceduna, which was really exciting for me.
It was the first ED locum I had done in a while. So, after upskilling with my ALS2. So just a little plug, I had a great time as well supported by Verity and your team.
[00:01:41] Ryan:
And if any of the doctors listening to this would like to experience the same joy that Anita had, then please don’t hesitate to get in touch.
[00:01:47] Anita:
Absolutely. Yes. I can only say good things. So, yes, me, I’ve been working as a GP Obstetrician for 23 years. I, uh, trained mostly in Western Australia, finished my fellowship here in Victoria, moving back with a small child and to be with family. I currently have two clinical lead roles in my day job, two organizations in Victoria and a GP practice and a sexual and reproductive health service.
So they’re both very fulfilling and rewarding roles that I have. I’m mum to two young men, one still in high school, the other one’s 19, about to leave and go and study in South Australia. And yes, I am a non-executive director on the board of SANE, which has been a very great journey for me.
They are an organization providing advocacy and support for people living with complex mental health and illness. So, I have been with them since 2018 as a peer ambassador and now board director. I also completed my yoga and meditation teacher training during COVID mostly to deepen my own practice, but ironically, I’ve brought some of that teaching into the SAST course as well.
[00:03:00] Ryan:
Yes. I, I forgot that you were a yogi or certainly… certainly qualified in yoga. So, you mentioned all of the different roles and activity that you’re involved in there. How do you manage to juggle all this with regards to managing to find the time to do all this? Because I know you’ve put a lot of effort into getting this SAST course off the ground.
[00:03:20] Anita:
It’s a long game. I … I guess I do things slowly, but try to invest in them well. So, the Self Awareness Skills Training Workshops, I started developing those in 2021 through the Future Leaders Program through the RACGP, but it was probably an idea long before that. So. It’s been three years and I will have run four by end of this year.
So actually, it’s been quite a slow burn, but it is my passion project. And I think if you’re going to do anything well, then it needs the time that it needs. And as for the day job and being mum and, you know, we all do that, right? All humans are probably juggling many balls in the air. So, I… yeah, I feel like I’m doing the things that I really love. That makes it easy. And I have to look after myself in terms of the basics when it comes to sleep and exercise to make sure I can fit things in.
[00:04:19] Ryan:
Well, I suppose that’s where some of the potential background of this course actually came from. It does actually tie in well with people that do have these very busy and demanding lives like … like a lot of doctors do, as we know.
And the course is designed around sort of the basis of ensuring that people are being aware of their own self-awareness around mental health. You mentioned you’ve done the course four times now, so that would be… that would be including the occasion that you did it here in the office in Sydney.
[00:04:48] Anita:
Yes, that will be this year. By the end of the year, I will have run it twice for 1Medical and twice for RANZCOG. Last year I ran it for RACGP Future Leaders Launch, so the new group of future leaders in Canberra. That was in March last year. I’ve run it for an Aboriginal medical service in Western Australia and also for their exec and for medical students from the Australian Medical Students Association.
So, quite a wide variety of individuals at all stages. So, I’ve had student doctors all the way through to consultants in their 70s, which is really exciting that people … that it’s resonating, I guess, and everyone takes something away from it and yeah, it’s, it’s exciting.
[00:05:34] Ryan:
Out of interest, just my own curiosity. How nervous were you the first time that you did it in front of a group of strangers and facilitated it for them?
[00:05:42] Anita:
I had huge imposter syndrome. I was very, very nervous and, lucky for me, my best friend happened to be doing that course. She was in the cohort, so she was in the audience sort of sparing me on. But the content is out there, right?
It’s about emotional intelligence and how to increase our self-awareness and why that’s important and developing a self-reflection in practice and why that’s important. I’ve condensed it and I’m delivering it, but really it’s how it lands with everyone and how they’re applying it to their own lives.
So, as they work through exercises over the day, it ends up being applied to their own individual circumstances, which is why I think it’s having such positive feedback.
[00:06:30] Ryan:
Yeah, because I mean, it’s a very interactive experience for the people that attend the course from what I saw and what I heard as well myself speaking to people afterwards.
So, Anita, before we get into the specifics of what a doctor might expect on the day when they attend the course, could you maybe give us some background into maybe the origins of the course and where it came from and how you came about to actually creating this for people?
[00:06:53] Anita:
Yes, Ryan, I can.
Eight years ago, I became part of the statistics that was the one in five Australian doctors to suffer an episode of mental ill health. I experienced an episode of major depression with suicidal ideation after a series of traumatic life events that occurred over a two-year period. I was divorced, young, trying to co-parent and raise two small kids with my ex-husband.
And going back to work full time, there was sort of a lot of, you know, pretty normal standard adjustments and transitions to work through these days. It was a lot, I guess. And so I think I was probably already moderately depressed, but young enough and fit enough such that I didn’t really… I had a GP practice for all the usual things, but no one was really checking in on me.
And then I lost my brother in an accident. And he was just 41 and it…you know, it was really, really difficult. Broke… broke my family. And it really tipped me over the edge and it happened so quickly, this sort of slide into this dark place that I had no insight, I think, because I’d started probably from that baseline of being moderately unwell, and then just slipped into…well, now I’m severely unwell and I just had no idea.
And so my lived experience was just this sort of tsunami of pain and grief and it was really difficult to do anything. And I wasn’t really aware of that, like … it was such an inner experience, I guess. So anyway, lucky for me I had … I didn’t actually want to die when I think back to thinking that I wanted to end my life. I just wanted the pain to stop. I just wanted to have a reprieve and I wanted some peace, which just shows how impaired my judgment was that I actually thought that was a reasonable and sensible option.
And lucky for me, a very dear friend called me out on it. She could see how unwell I was. I couldn’t. And when she did call me out on it, I said, “Do you think I’m depressed?” I mean, I really had no idea. I was so overwhelmed and sort of drowning that, I couldn’t see it.
So anyway, that led to a two-year recovery with lots of appointments with GP, psychologist, medication. I saw the psychiatrist, a psychiatrist once who said to me, the only thing that surprises me about this story is that you didn’t crash six months ago.
And I … looking back in that two-year recovery, that was the thing that I thought about the most. How did I get to 10 out of 10 on the level of distress? And don’t remember what I looked like or felt like when I was three out of 10, four out of 10, five out of 10, and perhaps still well enough to implement changes to catch myself, to get back on track. To ask for help when I felt like I had insight.
Does that make sense?
[00:10:08] Ryan:
No, it does Anita. And thank you very much for sharing that with us again for the benefit of people listening, potentially the first time they’ve heard it. I’ve heard that story from certainly, I think the first time that we spoke. And I do recall it quite vividly because I think that’s what attracted me the most to your ability to explain your experience and then how it led to this course and just having that level of honesty around, you know, your personal experience and why you’re doing what you’re doing now.
[00:10:35] Anita:
Well, it’s really interesting and it’s not … it’s never easy to tell it and, and I still feel lots of feelings, I guess, mixed feelings when I do tell a story, but I feel like it’s important because if one person hears that story and makes a different decision because it resonates with them, and that has happened, that has happened.
So people are approaching me after the course saying things like, “You’ve inspired me to talk to my GP about my mental health, or this has happened to me, and I’m now getting treatment, and, you know, there’s a lot of shame associated with it.” So, I feel like, you know, at the end of the day, Ryan, we’re all humans, and we’re all the same. Doctors, lawyers, recruiters, business owners, we all have the same human experiences.
So, it’s particularly hushed I guess, in medicine. It’s changing and it’s getting better and people are talking, which is really inspiring. But it’s sort of how … it got me thinking about, you know, how did I get there to that point?
And one of the things I reflected on is that my personality type was perfect for medicine and particularly in the time when I trained 20 years ago because there was no real teaching about this sort of stuff, about emotional intelligence, about self-awareness.
I remember very clearly as a fifth-year medical student being taught how to give bad news. And, you know, we do that a lot. We take people through their really dark, most difficult times. We’re taught how to give bad news whether it’s saying, you know, you’ve got a breast cancer or prostate cancer or terminal illness, and here are the next steps or a miscarriage or running a resus, crisis situations.
No one ever told me or acknowledged you’re going to have a significant emotional response to those things when they happen and that’s normal and no one ever really helped me figure out ways to process that or even to understand that it just needs time to process and that doesn’t necessarily mean days off needs time.
[00:12:47] Ryan:
It’s fairly hard to believe that the medical training even to this day potentially because this is what you and I have spoken about previously in this course is that the medical training doesn’t include a significant component around dealing with these types of realities of being a doctor and what the actual job entails, because it’s the same, it’s the same way with soldiers when they go to war and they’re in that level of crisis on a battlefield.
I’m not comparing the two directly, but I’m just using it as an example, because the mental trauma that comes from witnessing certain things at war and that type of thing, it’s not too dissimilar to being in an environment where you’re having to deliver news, you know, news like, “I’m very sorry, sir, but you’ve got three months left to live. I’m very sorry, madam, but your husband’s dead.” You know, like, that’s a total different world to 99 percent of other occupations.
[00:13:36] Anita:
Absolutely. And it’s really interesting that you say that. Well, first of all, I just want to address that. I think it is changing. I think that the junior doctors now and medical students are getting more training around emotional intelligence and self-awareness and mindfulness. I think trying to whether people invest in developing their own practice, that becomes a part of their every day is a different story.
And the second thing is… it’s really interesting you brought up the members of the military, particularly special forces.
There is actually studies looking at their ability to dissociate from their emotions in order… or to suppress that to be able to suppress their emotions in order to keep performing at a high level right on the battlefield.
[00:14:22] Ryan:
Yeah. to get the job done, yeah.
[00:14:23] Anita:
Absolutely. And you look at people in the medical field, we all do it and it doesn’t matter whether you’re a surgeon, whether you’re a GP, what kind of doctor you are, like public health pathologist, we’re all dealing with stories. We’re all dealing with illness and it does have an impact.
So, the course, I was inspired then to develop, I guess, content to share. As part of it, it was things I learned in my own journey about developing self-reflection practice and implementing that and also around understanding my emotional responses and how that impacts on others. And I definitely have become a better human for it. I’ve become better in a work sense, in my role as clinical lead in my two jobs. I’m better as a parent. I think I’m better as a friend and… yeah, it’s for everybody.
[00:15:23] Ryan:
Well, thank goodness for everyone’s benefit that your close friend did reach out that time and we are where we are today.
[00:15:29] Anita:
Yes, I am grateful every day.
[00:15:31] Ryan:
Yeah, there’s a few things I did want to say on that as well, but we’ll maybe come back to it later on because I did want to talk about, you know, how we as a company deal with locums out in the field and maybe some of those extra pressures that locums are under as well, and maybe some of the locums as well that are locuming because they’re at a stage in their life where maybe they are going through some form of change.
You know, you mentioned some things earlier on. So, for example, we have Locum doctors that work for us because they’ve missed out on the career opportunity that they wanted to do. So, they’re taking a year out, but they’re dealing with the emotion of missing out on that career opportunity. We have locums who are out working for various reasons as well.
We have a lot that go through divorces, we have a lot that are dealing with being away from home, being away from their children, missing out on, you know, their children’s upbringing and that type of thing. So that adds like an additional layer of complexity and stress on top of what is the substantial baseline challenges of mentally dealing with being a doctor as well.
Just as a side note on it, you mentioned about how like the medical field has changed in terms of like there is training now around awareness and emotional well-being and everything else. The recruitment sector and the locum agency sector has also changed.
Like we as agencies in particular with medical, we do a lot more now with regards to assisting with supporting people and assisting with stuff that would fall underneath the work health and safety and category. Multiple things of support and advice and information that we give to locums and we also then of course have a 24/7 support line that’s run by psychologists as a first point of call where any doctor that’s working for us can pick up that phone.
They’ve got the number and all of our correspondence and they can get straight through to speaking to somebody. And we have had some doctors that have used that. And historically when I started doing this, I would have thought that most doctors would never in a million years use that because of the persona of wanting to be the brave face and the show must go on. But now people are open to it and we openly have conversations with people about helping through their personal challenges and how they deal with that in conjunction with their work life. So that’s very different now versus 2010 when I first came to Australia and started doing this.
[00:17:47] Anita:
That’s so supportive of 1Medical. I think it’s really smart and I agree. When I think about every time. Most of the times, I’ve gone off and done locum work is during those transitions in between jobs or…
[00:17:59] Ryan:
Exactly, yeah.
[00:18:00] Anita:
Right? Yeah, rebuilding, I guess and that has been … even with 1Medical, that’s how I came to you obviously. I was so well supported, during that particular locum, and it was over Christmas, Boxing Day and New Year, which is a very difficult time. So, Yeah, it was …I think that’s really intelligent and hats off to you guys for doing it because it’s great that you’ve identified that because a lot of doctors may not actually be divulging it and to have that support in the background so that they do have opportunity.
Medicine can be a very lonely place sometimes and whilst going to amazing places doing locums is exciting and it pays well, which gives us some security. It also can be a time when you’re by yourself without any support and you might be reflecting on those sort of transitions that you’re going through.
So that’s great to hear.
[00:18:53] Ryan:
Yeah. It is ironic that you are actually being an example of that, how you came across us in that transition. So it’s again, it sort of validates what we’re talking about here. Just a final piece on it as well. We do have junior staff members that we hire into our business because that’s the nature of how you grow a recruitment business.
But for people’s reassurance that the senior experienced people are sat in the background and listening out for the warning signs. So, when we hear such … when we hear a sentence like, “Oh, Dr. X has just said Y to us or just said X to us” or whatever it might be, you know, we’re listening for those warning signs where we go. Do you think somebody needs to have a chat with them? Do you think they’re okay? Is that what’s going on behind the scenes there? So we are doing that here behind the scenes.
Moving on, I think, just for making sure that we get through the core bit here. So what can a doctor expect when they come on your course? Can you talk us through the day and how it would unfold for them and what they should be expecting to experience?
[00:19:48] Anita:
Yes. So the foundation is that I guess it’s confronting that idea that we are often just expected to keep going and that … to keep going and not processing thoughts, feelings, or stress has a cost. And even though over time our intellectual brains might need distance, might need to distance itself from those sorts of things because they can seem overwhelming. The long term cost is leading to a sense of feeling numb or compassion fatigue for others and themselves and burnout.
So, it’s not a cure or panacea for burnout. It’s really just helping reduce their vulnerability to it by increasing their understanding of where they’re at any given time. So then they can actively and intentionally do something about it.
So it’s known that doctors and all humans, I would argue, perform their best when their experience of medicine or their work is rewarding and satisfying. And having a strong internal locus of control is intrinsic to this. So, this is the foundation of the workshop, figuring out how do you strengthen your locus, internal locus of control.
So, what to expect on the day? They spend time working through exercises around the topics of emotional intelligence, values, self-awareness and self-reflection to gain a clearer understanding of themselves and their automatic patterns, and to consider where and if there are areas or room for improvement.
It’s an invitation, if you like, with knowledge, and then they get to decide whether or not or what suits them in terms of what they’d like to do.
[00:21:29] Ryan:
I’m guessing some people would maybe be quite upfront with opening up and getting involved straight away. And then other people might warm up a little bit into it during the day, would that be something that you see?
[00:21:39] Anita:
Yes, that is exactly what happens. And I have had people who turn up at the start of the day when I ask them, why are you here? They say, “To be honest, I’m here for the CPD hours because it’s really hard to get performance review hours.” And then by the end of the day, they are contributing and sharing.
Yeah, it is. It’s really interesting. And I think that the doctors are often surprised that the power of understanding that we’re all the same. We’re all struggling with the same things, such as a sense of imposter syndrome, feelings of inadequacy, guilt of not doing enough and having expectations of ourselves that are too high and what seems to become apparent by the end of the day that there often is a sense of relief that when they understand that we…
[00:22:32] Ryan:
You realize that you’re normal. You’re part of the same … everyone’s going through the same.
[00:22:35] Anita:
We don’t talk about it and it really mandates that the conversation is honest and authentic and that it has to be if it’s going to be effective to facilitate change insight observation facilitates insight, insight allows us to make effective change. So. Yeah.
[00:22:56] Ryan:
So the course … You’ve explained to me in previous occasions, the course actually doesn’t have a defined end time either, because depending on how the day unfolds and some people are quite keen to carry on talking, which we witnessed as well, so it can actually go on longer, which is a very good sign of how much people are actually getting from it.
[00:23:14] Anita:
Yeah, that’s true. And I mean …yes, that’s right. We are all out of the building by five o’clock. But yes, I have considered running it over two days or … but because people do … yeah, because they are actually processing and thinking about how to integrate what they’re learning from others.
One of the most exciting things is watching junior doctors in the room with the consultants and I didn’t think that would work. I didn’t think that would work. So, if I was to talk about success stories and feedback, that’s one of the things that has been … that I’ve learned that’s been really valuable watching senior staff who are very confident and self-assured where they’re at in their career actually learn from some of the juniors and also to share their own wisdom in a more vulnerable way and the junior is not feeling intimidated by it. So, that’s been really interesting.
[00:24:10] Ryan:
Well, this is a two-way street. You know the seniors have got a lot to give in terms of the knowledge and experience, but then the juniors, while they might not quite have as much potentially knowledge and experience, they’ve got entirely different perspective that allows potentially a more senior experienced person to take on board that perspective and then allow it to reprocess and reframe their own thoughts and their own experiences.
[00:24:32] Anita:
Yeah, that’s been really exciting to watch.
[00:24:35] Ryan:
Well, in terms of success stories, so I saw some of the success stories with the last course that was here. So, I walked a chap back to the car park, who was very enthused with how the day had gone.
And he was a senior rural GP as well himself with no doubt many war stories himself from working out in the field over the years. And he took a lot from that day. There was some follow up emails that were sent through as well, but I think yourself personally, you must get lots of feedback from the attendees post the events.
[00:25:02] Anita:
I do Ryan, and it’s really humbling actually. Probably the most poignant feedback I’ve had I think is two doctors who have written on their feedback forms something to be … they’ve written, “Thank you for sharing your story. You have inspired me to talk to my GP about my own mental health.” That’s two.
I’ve had been approached after presenting this in a talk by another two doctors individually who said, “I’m actually being treated for burnout, for depression. It’s been really hard. I understand what you’re saying and it resonates with me.”
They’re probably the most powerful… that’s the most powerful or valuable feedback because it does validate, I guess, sharing my experience that … I know six of my colleagues by face, by name, by voice who took their lives and I’m sure all of the doctors listening to this know at least one, if not more and it just breaks my heart that they were in such a dark place where they felt they had no other choice. So that’s also part of the inspiration, I guess of talking about it.
[00:26:13] Ryan:
Yeah, I mean, that obviously must make you feel great to actually see the direct impact that it’s having. But again, not to make it so much about yourself personally, of course, but it’s just if any one person can help any other one person, then it’s all been worthwhile is the way that everyone sees it, I believe.
Would there be anything else you’d like to say for people that are listening before we potentially wrap up here in terms of, is there anything else you’d like to say, make sure that people understand about the course or anything along those lines?
[00:26:38] Anita:
I’m learning from the participants as I go, and I think I’ve run it for almost … I did a head count this morning, maybe 75 people over the last two, yeah, 18 months.
And what I have learned, there’s still a lot of work to do in improving the systems and that is happening. There are some great initiatives by colleges and hospitals to facilitate change. I feel as though this work is personal, is a personal responsibility. You know, there’s stuff that other people can do, but really it comes down to us, you, the individual.
Are you willing to have a look at your own patterns? Are you willing to understand the role that you play in designing your life and how you manage your stress? That we all have something to learn for each other, that somehow the workshops seem to be a safe space where people are able to actually show themselves.
And what’s interesting is that some of the consultants and registrars are saying, “Oh, we wouldn’t say this in an M&M meeting.” Or there seems to be power in sharing who they are and how they’re actually coping or not, or what their actual observations are. Yeah. It’s of value it seems.
It’s really rewarding and fulfilling to see people intentionally try to do this work. And it is lifelong journey as you know, Ryan. So yeah, it feels really great to be able to invite people to think about it.
[00:28:29] Ryan:
No, it’s good. Yeah, it is a lifelong journey. It’s not just a case of going on the course and that’s it.
You need to continually be reflecting on this and being aware because as you know from your own experience, it’s quite easy to slide from a one to a five to a 10 without realizing, which is the scary thing, especially for strong personalities where the chances of that slide happening unnoticed are more so common because of that strong personality that’s there in the first place.
You’ve done the course now several times over the last couple of years and it’s starting to scale. What are your plans for the future? Like do you envisage this turning into your full time occupation, your full time gig and the joys that will come with actually turning it into a business?
[00:29:11] Anita:
Well, it’s, it’s really nice being hosted at the moment, but I love this work and yes, I definitely would love to offer it more frequently for sure. It is my passion project and it’s so rewarding to see people grow. I have three senior doctors who I have connected with coaches, and some with psychologists to help with their own growth and personal development.
And I am a big advocate for coaches to help people get to know themselves and to work to their strengths in all domains of life personally and professionally. So, I’m looking at doing my coaching certification in the next part of the year to offer that as well. But yes, I do hope that the Self-Awareness Skills Workshops takes up more of my life. That’s probably for next year, I think.
[00:30:11] Ryan:
You know, I’ve had conversations about the challenges of running businesses, so we can carry those conversations afterward, so don’t worry.
[00:30:17] Anita:
Yeah, I’ve been very lucky actually to be supported by Royal Australian College of Obstetrician Gynecologists to present this to their members and by 1Medical.
I am talking in the background with some other organizations about developing and delivering content for their members. So, stay tuned. That’s that’s in the background.
[00:30:37] Ryan:
That’s great. Well, hopefully, we get the opportunity to continue supporting you and you do push ahead with expanding this and getting it out there to more people and helping more people.
And so next course in Sydney, to get the details people, it’s the 23rd of November, I believe.
[00:30:53] Anita:
Yes.
[00:30:54] Ryan:
Yep.
[00:30:54] Anita:
Yes, Saturday, 23rd of November, 8:30 until 5, we’ve got the timing down for. Hosted by 1Medical here in Castlereagh Street, Sydney. Registration details on the website www.sast.au.
[00:31:10] Ryan:
And we’ll have to make sure that the food is as good this time.
[00:31:13] Anita:
The food was phenomenal. Thanks to Jenny, yes. Thank you, Ryan.
[00:31:19] Ryan:
Well, Anita, I mean, unless there’s anything else you’d like to say at this stage, it’s been a pleasure talking to you. Would there be anything you’d like to add?
[00:31:26] Anita:
Yes. Thanks, Ryan. I would and it sort of ties together the importance of having a self-reflection practice, being self-aware, working on that and improving your emotional intelligence skills. And it’s sort of rounded up in this quote by Viktor Frankl. And the quote is, “Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
And I think in medicine, we often feel like our backs against the wall. We’re too busy, too tired to make choices that are going to change our lives. But your whole business is built on doctors who are willing to make different choices, right? They’re locuming for whatever reason in their life. So, we do have a lot more choice than we think. So that’d be how I’d like to end. We do, we can design the life that we want.
[00:32:26] Ryan:
I think a lot of people will be very keen to design the life that they want and it is achievable and certainly for doctors, you know, it is one of those fantastic professions where you do have so much choice, so much opportunity and you can do things that a lot of other people would never get the chance to experience.
So we have some very, very interesting people on the books that are out working and they’re doing some very interesting things that the average person would never see.
[00:32:50] Anita:
I think we have the best career in the world. I think there’s not many careers where you get to be challenged and stimulated until your last breath, and medicine is like that, and it’s such a privilege to be a part of people’s best days, worst days and in between days. So, I agree with you and I think we need to be well ourselves in order to feel that satisfaction and reward and joy in our job. So that’s, that’s what I hope that this course can help bolster in medical professionals’ lives.
[00:33:25] Ryan:
Yeah. We when we have people join us here in the recruitment agency, we explain to them, especially if they’ve come from another form of recruitment that isn’t medical, that isn’t dealing with doctors.
We explain to them how different this role or career with those is going to be because it’s not just a form of recruitment. It’s really becoming an embedded part in people’s lives and that entire space of being sort of the second line behind the scenes of making sure that the critical workforce gets to work entirely changes the whole premise of the job.
So, we try and explain it to people before they join us, but until they’ve actually experienced it, they never truly understand it or believe me. Anita look, thank you so much for this. It’s much appreciated and thanks for being great to work with over the last year or two.
And thanks a lot for the previous course. I’m looking forward to the next upcoming course and making sure that we get that out there and get some, attendees on board, and have another great day with it. So, thank you very much indeed.
[00:34:24] Anita:
Thank you, Ryan. Well, thank you so much for supporting, a course that openly talks about doctor’s mental health.
It’s really, really huge. I know you run ALS courses and some emergency medicine courses. It’s, it’s really great to see that you’re supporting this as a part of an all-round wellness for your doctors. So, thank you.
[00:34:47] Ryan:
My pleasure, Anita. Thank you very much indeed. And I wish you well.
[00:34:51] Anita:
Thank you. See you. Bye. All the best.
[00:34:53] Ryan:
Cheers. All the best.
