Baby steps: starting out as a clinical academic

Sitting in a cold lecture theatre, being inducted into yet another NHS trust, I have for the first time this month, leisure to reflect on my initial 30 days as a clinical academic.

It has, as expected, been a rollercoaster ride. In the last month, I have not only moved into a new office and a new laboratory in a new department, but stepped up from specialist trainee to honorary consultant at one of the biggest NHS trusts in the country and taken on the role as lead for infection teaching in the  new curriculum for the MBChB course at Warwick Medical School.

Piles of paperwork, arcane computer systems, health and safety, one regular and two honorary contracts, all the paraphernalia of a new job doubled.

It has been an exciting few weeks; we inaugurated our brand new department with a symposium packed with great science (see our Storify here), I have some brilliant new colleagues, both clinical and academic and I am beginning to crank up the research. Lectures written, external lecturers cajoled, teaching materials reviewed and supplemented and a whole new virtual learning environment encountered, it makes me slightly breathless just thinking about it. When combined with my "extramural" commitments, it is slightly amazing I (and all the other new starters all over the country) haven't subsided gently into wobbling agar jelly. 

I can, and do, maintain a professional front at work, but like most other employees, I strive for a work-life balance which sits in some sort of equilibrium. In my case, the see-saw is still lurching wildly as we incorporate a house move, an unfinished kitchen, a bike-train-bike commute and, most importantly, two children to settle into new schools, one of them for the first time. I have a multi-coloured spreadsheet containing all the details of who is taking whom, with what, when and where; all of which starts to sound like "Cluedo", but less fun. Nonetheless, an entirely familiar game for working parents.

So why do I do it? Well, the science, as alluded to above, is great (new colleagues blog and tweet @mjpallen, @gingermicrobe, @milja001, @antibugdoc, @MicrobLog_me_uk). It is an exciting time to be dealing with clinical infection and ensuring that "Tomorrow's Doctors" know about and manage infection properly is an important part of my role.

All I have to do now is find time and space to plan and write grant applications which I can get funded....