I’m a consultant psychiatrist at Austin Health, working with returned veterans and defence force personnel, largely with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I also teach into the Master of Psychiatry and other graduate programs.

I was attracted to psychiatry because of its diversity and because you have an opportunity to get to know your patients much better than in many other specialties. Because mental illness is a complex condition that affects different aspects of our lives, including physical health, we work with the whole person rather than one particular body system. And there’s also a lot going on in terms of research, which really appealed to me.

Studying the Master of Psychiatry at Melbourne gives you access to international experts across a broad range of topics, and the opportunity engage with leaders in the field. It also means there is a great range of mentors and research supervisors available, who are actively involved in current research.

Another really useful aspect of the course is that it is mostly entirely taught by psychiatrists, which makes the entire content highly relevant to clinical practice. The selectives also give you the flexibility to dig deeper into your specific interests.

I’ve stayed in touch with the University since graduating, and I have an honourary appointment now. I was involved in developing the online version of the Master of Psychiatry, which I think is a really efficient way to do the course. Being able to refer back to previous lectures or notes is very useful, and of course the flexibility is a great option for so many people.

I’m about to start a PhD applying machine learning to psychiatry, so I’m still learning! Psychiatry has been a very rich and rewarding career path.