Paul Smith Editor

Associate Professor Sally Shrapnel spent nearly 20 years working as a GP.

But in her 40s, she took a quantum leap, retraining as a physicist.

Now deputy director of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems at the University of Queensland, she speaks to Australian Doctor about the need for all doctors to embrace life’ s uncertainty principle.

Australian Doctor: From what I’ ve read about you, your passions at school were mathematical. How did you end up at medical school?

Associate Professor Sally Shrapnel: I loved maths and physics at school, and once I left, I enrolled in a science degree doing physics honours at the University of Queensland, but I felt at the time that if maths and physics were going to be my career, I would end up being quite socially isolated.

I was interested in cosmology, and I thought,‘ Oh look, I’ m going to end up in some radio telescope facility somewhere in the middle of nowhere.’

I’ m quite a social person, I like people. So I thought, I’ ll see what medicine’ s like.

It wasn’ t so much the usual calling of wanting to be a doctor and cure cancer. I wanted to understand human physiology. The human body is amazing. I just wanted to understand how it worked.

So I swapped over to medicine, and then halfway through my medical degree I did a bachelor of medical science.

AD: You did your internship at Cairns Base Hospital in Queensland?

Professor Shrapnel: That’ s right, but it was during that time I started to miss using that part of my brain that was into abstract mathematical thinking, and I was told about a course at Imperial College London, a master’ s degree in physics and engineering in medicine.

It was meant for physicists, computer scientists, engineers and mathematicians. But they had opened it to those with a medical degree and some interest or background in maths or physics.

AD: How old were you at this point?

Professor Shrapnel: I was 26. So I did that and I was lucky enough to end up top of the class, with a prize and an opportunity to do a PhD at

Cambridge. But I was at a real crossroads.

I missed the clinical side. I just knew that I wanted patient contact because, during that master’ s degree, I’ d been doing locums at hospitals in London as well as working in an HIV hospice in Earl’ s Court. I just wasn’ t ready to give up the clinical role.

AD: But you were saying goodbye to a big part of your mental life through that decision?

Professor Shrapnel: To be perfectly honest, the decision-maker for me was that there were just very few female role models in academia then that were able to spend time with their children. And I didn’ t want to sacrifice having a family life.

But I would stress, I didn’ t ever think I was closing the door. I always thought that there would be a time, when my family was a bit more grown-up, that I would be able to go back to science and research.

It’ s funny. I look back now and I’ ve no idea why I was so sure because not many people do that.

AD: You hear that in maths and physics, you make your biggest contributions when young. I may be simplifying a little, from personal experience, but after you hit your late 30s / 40s your brain starts turning to fudge.

Professor Shrapnel: Look, it’ s become a myth and one I think comes from cherry-picked data.

You look at the contributions that great physicists, chemists and physiologists have made over their careers, and it doesn’ t all happen in their 20s.

There are famous cases. Einstein discovered relativity and explained the photoelectric effect in his 20s.

But in the last 50 years, science has changed a lot. People used to work in relative isolation, and they’ d have these big breakthroughs on their own.

Science today is hugely collaborative. Very

few people make breakthroughs on their own. It’ s teamwork, and the people in those teams are always at different stages of their careers.

The younger members benefit from the experience of the older researchers, and the older researchers benefit from the open-mindedness and enthusiasm of the younger members.

Good science now really comes down to good teamwork.

AD: You said you decided on a clinical pathway into the research side, at one point you were looking at specialising in radiology, but you were seduced by general practice. What happened?

Professor Shrapnel: I had the opportunity to do a temporary GP job out in the middle of rural Tasmania.

And I thought,‘ This will be a nice quiet job where I can get some study done.’ But it was just so much fun. Suddenly you get to use all the stuff you learned at medical school.

The people were also lovely. I just felt truly engaged in what I was doing. Despite the relative remoteness, it wasn’ t scary— Hobart was two hours down the track. It just suited me. So I joined the GP training program and did my fellowship.

AD: You saw the difference you made to people’ s lives as a GP?

Professor Shrapnel: Definitely. It was also the stimulation of not knowing what was coming in the door and unpredictability. Novelty is something that I seek, and I couldn’ t imagine being a specialist doing one thing.

AD: But did your mind ever wander? You know, you’ re thinking about Heisenberg’ s uncertainty principle when a patient was coming in for a repeat script?

Professor Shrapnel: During my RACGP training in Tassie, I was also enrolled at the University of Tasmania so I could learn computer