What does a pathologist do?

Dr Catherine Koleda from Wellington Hospital talks about what a pathologist does and how she came to be one. Wellington Hospital is operated by the Capital & Coast District Health Board.

Acknowlegements:
Capital & Coast District Health Board
Louise Goossens, Wellington School of Medicine

Transcript

DR CATHERINE KOLEDA
A pathologist is basically a doctor who looks after patients, but they spend most of their time looking at the tissue of the body or the fluid of the body to help make diagnosis. I was working as a junior doctor in the hospital and I enjoyed that very much and I actually enjoyed meeting with patients, but just before I came into pathology I was working in the cancer ward and I did find it really quite stressful being directly involved with people who were getting malignant diagnosis. By being a pathologist I know that I am helping those people and I know I'm doing a really important job but the emotional aspects of it aren’t – I’m not directly involved in those. And so that’s helpful for me. Also pathology is fascinating, the human body is fascinating, its a very visual subject, and I really like understanding the body in terms of what cells and tissue look like.