bioneural.net

When I met with Professor Crampton from the Department of Public Health at the University of Otago in Wellington last year, I was concerned about the difficulty I might face in making a transition from general practice (focussing on the problems of individuals) to public health (focussing on the problems of communities). The Prof. helpfully drew a graph on his whiteboard that I duly jotted down, illustrating three other crucial aspects of a career transition to be aware of aside from a shift in mindset.

Beware of the dip

The graph he drew is actually pretty generic, applicable to virtually any career transition (as in significant change that involves re-training; I'm not talking about getting promoted). Anyway, I've jazzed it up a bit and added in a "sink or swim" metaphor:

Beware of the dip: keep swimming, or risk sinking

I think it's pretty self-explanatory, but in case not it suggests that as you move over time from career A into career B you will experience a drop in professional competence, income, and self-esteem. As you become established in the new career, these losses are reversed. But there is a danger period in which you are not competent in the procedures & practice of either career, not well remunerated, and not feeling all that great about being in a kind of limbo. The best way to survive it, the Prof. says, is to tell everyone around you about it so they know to expect it and come to understand it. Sounds like good advice to me—and definitely worth sharing.

With that in mind in a few days I commence a "new route" PhD in Public Health at the School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR) within the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Sheffield. This means three years of research preceded by a preparatory year in which I should get a good academic overview of the discipline (resulting in a MPH). I expect it to be both challenging and rewarding.

One of the research interests of the public health section is geographical information sciences (GIS), although I hadn't fully appreciated the historical importance of the link between medicine and mapping until I read The Ghost Map. Given my interest in geotagging, medical informatics, and support for the Geotag Icon Project, it won't come as a surprise that I'm particularly anticipating the Public Health Informatics module, which includes teaching on GIS.

500

Coincidentally, this post marks the 500th since things kicked off in October 2003. As of the 100th post in December 2004 I noted a count of just over 3000 unique visitors who deposited 46 comments during 15 months. Some current statistics are automatically updated here, with the comment count now standing at 1396. Mint tells me that in July alone the site received over 24,000 unique visitors, the most in any one month period to date I think (I wish our investments had that growth rate!). FeedBurner reports a much more modest 190 subscribers, so most visitors are "casual" (or bots). It does imply however that I have no idea who 97% of my "regulars" are.

It is possible posting frequency and/ or length will suffer if I find myself lacking the spare time to delve into some things as deeply as I have done in the past. If you are a regular reader of this blog but don't tend to comment, why not "decloak" to say hello at this time and let me know what you'd like to see more of in the way of future content—or even what made you subscribe. Although my blog isn't primarily intended for anyone other than myself, the joy in helping other folk discover new and exciting things is a certainly pleasant side benefit ;-)

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