June 17, 2024 • 23 mins
Today we meet Joanna, who is a new Australia citizen. She works as a doctor, has recently run a marathon. She loves Cluedo and has a keen interest in earning the organ...
Can Art guess what Jo is concealing, or will she be dead wrong?
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Instagram: instagram.com/concealedwithartsimone/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
It's me, the drop dead gorgeous at Simone. I know
not everyone in this world is as physically blessed as
I am, but it's okay because I'm making a space
for the extremely regular normal people that walk among us.
Except there's one catch. These normals are concealing something that
makes them interesting, exciting, worthy of our time. What is
(00:32):
that thing? Well, I don't know, but I'll slice it
open and chisel away until I have the truth. This
is concealed with me atsimone oh. Time for the guest
roll the time. Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
My name is Joanna. I'm from New Zealand but moved
to Australia a few years ago and just became a citizen.
I work as a doctor and spent many years studying.
I ran my first marathon last year and enjoy swimming,
reading and gardening.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Hello, Joeanna, how are you?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I am great? Thank you Joe, for sure, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
I'll be beautiful. Well, hello Joe, my name's out. Love
to meet you. To meet you all right now, we've
never met before in my life that I know of, correct,
Maybe in a past life We'll never know, maybe maybe,
But you're here in front of me. You've got you
put the sparkles on today. You've got your Diamonte stars
and lightning bolts all over your beautiful blaze that resistant
every day. Are you an everyday sparkler or is this
a special occasion sparkler?
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Oh, it has to be a special occasion sparkle.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Oh, I see, I would know I'm an everyday sparkler.
A special occasion is when I'm in all Matt and
people go what's going on? That's how I make a statement.
If I want to do something for a red carpet,
I just go completely dull Matt and people go, Wow,
that's really new. That's that's amazing for you.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
I know.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
I'm very first the top. So you're from New Zealand originally?
What made you take the jump over across the ditch?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
A job opportunity that I couldn't turn down?
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Well, that is good. We love jobs now, I mean
I didn't have one, but I'm sure people that need
jobs love them too. I just dress up as a lady,
but I think I do it well.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
You do?
Speaker 1 (02:12):
And a doctor? Now? Am I allowed to go into
what doc type of doctor you are? Or is that
still a mystery?
Speaker 2 (02:17):
It's probably a mystery, Okay, I won't.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Poke on the doctor. Note, I won't poke on the
doctor date. And you ran a marathon?
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I did. How That's what I ask myself.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Do you have to train for it?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
I did, and it was probably one of the hardest
things I've ever done. Yeah, but I did it.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
What happens when you've done it? What happens then?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Do you go, Well, you get a T shirt, you
get some bananas at the end, and you go that
was worthwhile. I'm so glad I did that. Everything hurts.
But look, I've got a banana.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
I hope you've put that banana on the wall. Like
the current at the NGV, there's a banana duct taped
to a wall at the moment.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Yeah, that's my banana.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Oh, I see, I see our thoughts. So I thought.
So I'm gonna ask you three questions, and from the
answers to those three questions, I have to try and
work out what it is you're concealing from me today,
Miss doctor Joe. Okay, all right, So the first question
I have for you is what was your favorite board
game growing up?
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Well, that would probably have to be Cludo Cludo.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Okay, Now that's the one where it's like mister Murder Mystery.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
It is Miss Scarlet and the Library with the Dagger.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Wow. I've actually never played Cludo because I feel like
there's too much reading involved. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (03:36):
I like reading?
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Yeah, well that's good. Do you have any tips for Cludo?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
You just have to write down the answers as you go, okay,
and then you can systematically work it out.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Systematically. That's a big word today, Joe. All Right, I
can't spell that. I've just written s y. I'll remember
what that means. Okay, Cludo cludo, butana doctor doctor banana cludo. Okay,
so I've got so far. Question number two, if you
could pick one obscure instrument to be proficient at, what
would it be?
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Well, I would definitely have to be the organ.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Oh my goodness, the organ. Now. I see a little
glint in your eye when you say organ, and something
tells me you're not talking about the musical instrument. I
don't know. It's a viber picking up.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
I could be wronging all sorts of organs.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Yeah, like electric ones. One's a blow, a lot of
a ones. You're with blood organ, all right, banana organ,
dr Marathon Okay, new Zealand.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
The final question after you is if you could get
the answer to one question, what would it be?
Speaker 2 (04:54):
What happens after death?
Speaker 1 (04:56):
Wife? After death? Okay? Dead? All right? Dead banana doctor organ,
New Zealand, dead bananas, get rid of banana. That's a
red herring. Cludo mystery mystery, mystery, murder mystery because I'm
obviously picking up organ, which is like body things included,
which is like murder. But then life after death and
(05:20):
that I don't know what that means. All right now
I'm going dead things, things that go inside dead things
and dead people. I love that. Are you a moutician?
Speaker 2 (05:34):
I am a forensic pathologist. I perform autopsies and work
closely with the coroner to determine the cause of death
in certain cases with closed you were.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
It wasn't a banana. Did you know? When I was
a kid, I always wanted to be a forensic pathologist. Well, literally,
I did work experience, not with the actual dead bodies,
but I went and worked and was looking at cells
and stuff for every Oh my goodness, how niche ah
ah close but those cinger. No, Joe is not a mortician,
(06:09):
she is a forensic pathologists. Close iwit's close. I don't
want to name more. Please Okay, So we hear with
Joe the forensic pathologist. Oh my goodness, did you wash
your hands today? Ah? Good question, no comment, all right.
(06:36):
So for people that don't know what a forensic pathologist is,
please explain it to us here.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
So, a forensic pathologist is a medical doctor who specializes
in forensic pathology. Now, pathology itself is the study of disease,
it causes, how you diagnose it, And a forensic pathologist
in particular has interest in injuries, how they're caused, how
they might cause death or contribute to death.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
So to become a forensic pathologist, do you have to do?
What's the pipeline to forensic pathology? How do you get there?
How do you start working with living things dead things?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
It's pretty diverse. For most of us. You do your
medical degree and then go in and work in the hospitals,
and for some people they love that, for some of
us not so much. And you develop an interest in pathology,
which is all about problem solving and diagnosing disease and
getting to the bottom of things, which is part of
the perks of the job. And then from there, for me,
(07:33):
it evolved from surgical training, loving pathology, combining the two
and doing forensic pathology, and once you get in you
realize it is one of the best jobs in the world.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
Because you are doing a real life Cludo.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
It is. It is a real life Cluto.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Now, did you see a big mass intake in the
forensic pathology and biomedical science world thanks to shows like
CSI and NCI and Law and Order.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
It's definitely helped increase the visuals on our job and
people know what it is. People know what we do,
and I think it has increased the interest. Also, then
when people realize it's thirteen to sixteen years of medical
and specialist training, then the interest sort of drops off
from there.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Look, I'll said earlier, I wanted to be a forensic pathologist,
look at me now. Didn't quite make it. But you
know what, that's fine. At least we've got you in
the world. But I think that's an issue that happened
too with the shows like CSAs. People think the person
just does everything. They're like, oh, they're going to be
going spraying for the blood over there, and then they're
going to be in the lab do it cutting people.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Up, and they think that we do it in six
inch stilettos and miniskirts.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Do you actually do autopsies yes? Is that like your
main specialty that you're like, all right, bring them in.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
Yeah. It's one of the tools that we've got to
investigate death. So we have many We have our medical knowledge,
what we read from the medical records or from the circumstances.
We have a CT scan and soon to be an
MRI scan so we can get radiology imaging of the deceased.
And we have autopsies, which enables us to examine everything internally,
(09:14):
look for diseases, abnormalities, injuries, see what's going on on
the inside.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Would your scans would they be preferable because they're non
intrusive for some people, or is most time you're like,
we just got to get in there and have a squiz.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
It really depends on the case a lot of the time,
and I think societally there's less comfort with autopsies and
internal examinations. Autopsies have a bit of a bad reputation,
but what they really are is exploratory surgery. It enables
us to go in and find out what's wrong, gives
us information. But in many cases, the CT gives us
that information. If there's a motor vehicle accident, we can
(09:50):
see the injuries. We can see the fractures or the bleeding,
and in about half of our cases that are reported
to the coroner, they don't need a full autopsy.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Are you studying to be a surgeon or specializing in
sur gin practices? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So when I was at medical school, I always wanted
to do surgery. That's what I wanted, And then got
out of medical school, got on the surgical training program,
did the first part exams, and the more I did it,
the less I liked it. And I was getting to
that stage where like many junior doctors, I was tired, jaded,
just completely burnt out. And I thought, I'll take a
(10:29):
year off do pathology because these pathologists walk into the room.
And there was one in his jeans and his leather
jacket and he seemed really smart and really cool, and
I thought about it, no more than he looks neat,
I'll go and hang out in that department for a year.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
That's all it takes.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
Loved it so much I never went back to surgery.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
Right, I guess you'd at the end of the day.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
So I get to do surgery still, but I don't
have to worry about things working again afterwards.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
So I think I'm a bit of a different person
in that this stuff doesn't give me the eg or
does it make me feel uncomfortable. I think death is
a really difficult topic for a lot of people to grasp.
Have you ever suffered a bit of I don't know,
stigma against your job and your profession and what you do.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Yeah, I think people are in equal parts fascinated by
it and can't understand how you can do it as
a job. There is definitely stigma. A lot of it
comes from my fellow medical practitioners. They don't understand why
you wouldn't want to be in a hospital dealing with patients.
Whereas I say, I still get to deal with patients,
but I also get to deal with police and doctors
(11:35):
and lawyers and all sorts of people, which is really
fun and diverse and an interesting part of the job.
And the stigma and he comes when people don't understand
what it is, when we realize it's actually medicine. It's
finding answers for families. I mean, where the deceased last doctor?
Speaker 1 (11:53):
That's true.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
We get to explain what happened. It's a really privileged
position to be the first person in some cases to know,
so what happened to this person and what they went
through and to be able to provide answers and explain that.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Yeah, totally not to lead into that stigma, but has
anything spooky happened? Any ghosts?
Speaker 2 (12:14):
We just employ them as part of the stuff.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Good. Yeah, good, you're like, well, why are you here?
Can you just hand me that over there please?
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Most of the creepy things would be creepy crawleyes.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Oh really, well, that's the thing. So you would get patients.
Do you call them patients or do you call them
We call them the deceased. You would get the deceased
in lots of different circumstances and what's the word condition conditions? Yes,
you get them in all different types of conditions. So
(12:48):
what could this range? With someone who just looks like
they've fallen asleep or someone that is covered in bugs.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Absolutely, we get everything, particularly in summertime when it's a
lot hotter. Oh yeah, is decomposed a lot faster in
the heat. But then there's the winter time phenomenon where
people die in bed with their electric blankets on. Ah,
and the heat's not so great. They don't look like
they've just fallen asleep. So yeah, we get a real
range and you learn to expect and see what you find.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
Is there a favorite time of year to work? Is
there one peer where you're like everyone that comes in
is genuinely pleasant to work with.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Public holidays and school holidays because everyone goes out of Victoria.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
That's true, Like no one here.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
It all quietens down.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
Are you so you're working for Like, would you work
with the police? Does that mean you have to go
to court?
Speaker 2 (13:43):
It does?
Speaker 1 (13:44):
It does.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
So there's always somebody on call twenty four to seven.
So if there's a homicide or a suspicious death, we
can go out to the scene for that, or we'll
do the autopsy for that. And so we work closely
with the police from that point of view. And yes,
we go to court probably ten times or so for
giving evidence for those cases. Is that annoying, No, it's
(14:05):
part of the job that just every day.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
If you're lying, we're going to ask our other specialist person.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Oh, we certainly get that from defense lawyers. They call
you miss to try and downplay it, play the games,
but we know the games and you just don't let
it get to you.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
So that also means in my head, you're just working
at wherever you work. But do you have to go
out to actual crime scenes as well? Sometimes we do.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
We don't get to go to anywhere near as many
as we'd like. But it's come on, well, if it's
in a scenic location, it's true. Ice cream on the
way back.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
I know that is true. Once you've done your job,
that is true.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Not an ice s cream on the way there that
would be performed.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Do you ever still get surprised? Are there some things
or if you feel like you've pretty much seen it
all now?
Speaker 2 (14:54):
Yeah, there's not a lot now that human imagination can
think of to do that makes me think, really, because
I've said that so many times that I just think, okay,
well we'll roll with that. I won't think about that
too hard, and we'll just go with what we've got.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, in your first years where they're like, oh okay, yep.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
Yes, definitely, humans are very creative, and the weird and
wonderful things that we can do to ourselves we can
do to other people. Often things that start with a
group of blokes with beer and someone saying, hey, guys,
watch this, it'll be awesome. Often ends not so well.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
The lad's the lad's the lads.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Luckily I'm not one of them exactly.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
I'm one of the gals. Are there any high profile
cases you've worked on that you probably can't talk about,
but maybe you could like allude to. Are the ones
that I'm winking, by the.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Way, the ones that always get get mentioned. That I
was fortunate, unfortunate enough to be on call for was
the tragedies of Euridicity Dixon and i am Asawe. I
was on call for both of those cases. When those
poor young ladies came to us, they shocked me. I
(16:11):
didn't mean to be flippant with my answer before, but
there are still cases that do shock you. And that
was them, the randomness, the degree of injury, and there
are still cases which do impact you. We may be
able to approach a number of cases in a scientific way,
(16:31):
but there are still some where you think, no, I'm
still human, I'm still a member of this community, and
I don't think that's okay.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Yeah. So, which brings me to my next question is
you obviously deal with a lot of heavy and impactful situations.
How do you deal with that.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Our workplace is very proactive with that, with offering support,
whether it's something formal and regular that you want, whether
it's something on a as you need it basis, but
also that informal support we have from having a great
bunch of pathologists. There's sixteen of us. We're a wonderful
bunch of people and we're a very tight team, and
(17:10):
that support that everyone gives each other is one of
the most invaluable things. And getting through these cases where
you can go into a colleagues's office and just say
had a bit of a rough case and they'll understand
and you can talk it through. And that might just
be going out for a cup of coffee, might be
going out for something a bit stronger. But having that
support and that friendship in the group is one of
(17:32):
the key things. But certainly the employer is really proactive.
They recognize that everyone is at risk.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Is there ever a circumstance where you can't work out
the cause of death and you can't work out what's happened?
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Yeah, probably about under five percent of cases we'd have
it where the cause of death is not able to
be ascertained or determined. Despite everything that we can do,
and there's a number of reasons for that. Times it's
because the body is in a state of decomposition and
we've just lost data because it's decomposed. Sometimes it's young
(18:08):
people that die, and it's often commonly in young people
because the cause is not something structural in the heart
or the lungs, or the brain or any of the
other organs. It's something genetic that causes the heart not
to function properly or the brain not to function properly
in cause seizures. And so we work really closely with
the Children's hospital with Royal Melbourne Hospital and the geneticists
(18:30):
and the cardiologists there to get the person and their
family looked at and tested because these things can run
in families, so it's really important to get them followed
up to prevent deaths in the future. So unascertained as
a cause of death doesn't necessarily mean I don't know.
It means I haven't found anything anatomically wrong, or there's
(18:50):
nothing in the toxicology or the biochemistry or on the
CT scan, but I suspect there's something else going on
and it may be genetic, and we refer the families
off in that case when is.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
The cutoff point for you to stop trying to work
it out? They all right, put it down, Love, Come on, Joe,
We've got to move on.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
I think it depends on the case. The younger the
person is, the more you're going to do for them,
because you really know that it's important to get to
the bottom of it.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
I was listing something the other day and they'd found
remains like six to twelve months later and they could
still work out the cause of death from it. How
does that? That is the craziest puzzle in the world.
How do you How do you look at a stack
of bones and go, oh, yeah, this happened.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Hell depends. There can actually still be quite a lot
of information you can get. There might even after six
to twelve months, there might be little bits of soft
tissue left that can give you clues. Or if it's
an injury that's damaged the bone. We work closely with
anthropologists who are experts in looking at bones, looking at abnormalodies,
and they can help us to tell if that bone
(19:54):
e injury is something that happened after death, or you know,
from animal scavenging or something. I guess if it's something
happened before so you can actually still get a lot
of information. And those are the cases we actually do
spend a lot of time on, because paradoxically, the less
of a person you have, the longer it takes to
look at everything and try and figure it out.
Speaker 1 (20:15):
Does it feel like making the world a better place?
How do you feel about that?
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Well, apart from skipping out of the office each day
with you know, bluebirds and rainbows and haply singing a
happy tune. No, it's a wonderful job. It's really rewarding.
Every day is different. Yeah, I mean I get to
come and chat with you.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Oh pretty good, isn't it. I get to go to court,
I get to.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
Go to the crime scenes. It's a really rewarding job.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Yeah, you know. I like what I do. But you
literally help people, ash, I didn't think i'd walk out
feeling bad about myself today. To close out, I want
to see if you can give you a hypothetical situation,
and if you give me a few clues as to
something you might be finding during an autopsy, and I
want to see if I can determine the cause of death.
(21:05):
I'll work out I'm going to be Pluto person. I
get my pen ready. Is there a banana involved? There is? Okay,
all right, okay, okay with you all right.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
So we have a because I'm a new Zealander, he'll
have to be sixty six, okay, sixty six year old man?
Speaker 1 (21:20):
Yes, I like that.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
Was eating a banana and he developed heaviness in his chests,
collapsed and couldn't be resuscitated.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Okay, right, couldn't be blown.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
He's got high blood pressure okay, diabetes, and he smokes
and he hasn't been to the gym.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
I can't believe it ever describing my father like this.
This is so embarrassing. No, I don't have fun anyway, Okay, okay.
So he's unhealthy. He's pretty unhealthy. Bad cholesterol, yes, probably undoubtedly, Yeah,
bad cholesterol, high blood pressure, eating banana. I think the
banana's red herring again. Actually, he died because he finally
(22:07):
had something healthy to eat. His body went into shock.
He's been eating chicken nuggets his whole life, and he
had the banana and his body was like what this?
And then he felt heavy and dropped to the ground.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
Did I sorted? Solved? Solved?
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Did he have a heart attack? Yes, because of the banana.
I can't wait to do my internship for the second time.
I'll stick it the whole way through this time. She's
got to fix the lighting. I hate fluorescent lightings. Ah,
and I think the moral to this story is don't
(22:47):
trust bananas, and I'll take that to the bank. You've
been listening to an iHeart Australia production concealed with Art Simone.
Listen to more of what you love on iHeart and
these too drop dead gorgeous ladies. Check us out on
the Star Shows.
It's me, the drop dead gorgeous at Simone. I know
not everyone in this world is as physically blessed as
I am, but it's okay because I'm making a space
for the extremely regular normal people that walk among us.
Except there's one catch. These normals are concealing something that
makes them interesting, exciting, worthy of our time. What is
(00:32):
that thing? Well, I don't know, but I'll slice it
open and chisel away until I have the truth. This
is concealed with me atsimone oh. Time for the guest
roll the time. Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
My name is Joanna. I'm from New Zealand but moved
to Australia a few years ago and just became a citizen.
I work as a doctor and spent many years studying.
I ran my first marathon last year and enjoy swimming,
reading and gardening.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Hello, Joeanna, how are you?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I am great? Thank you Joe, for sure, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
I'll be beautiful. Well, hello Joe, my name's out. Love
to meet you. To meet you all right now, we've
never met before in my life that I know of, correct,
Maybe in a past life We'll never know, maybe maybe,
But you're here in front of me. You've got you
put the sparkles on today. You've got your Diamonte stars
and lightning bolts all over your beautiful blaze that resistant
every day. Are you an everyday sparkler or is this
a special occasion sparkler?
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Oh, it has to be a special occasion sparkle.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Oh, I see, I would know I'm an everyday sparkler.
A special occasion is when I'm in all Matt and
people go what's going on? That's how I make a statement.
If I want to do something for a red carpet,
I just go completely dull Matt and people go, Wow,
that's really new. That's that's amazing for you.
Speaker 2 (01:48):
I know.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
I'm very first the top. So you're from New Zealand originally?
What made you take the jump over across the ditch?
Speaker 2 (01:56):
A job opportunity that I couldn't turn down?
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Well, that is good. We love jobs now, I mean
I didn't have one, but I'm sure people that need
jobs love them too. I just dress up as a lady,
but I think I do it well.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
You do?
Speaker 1 (02:12):
And a doctor? Now? Am I allowed to go into
what doc type of doctor you are? Or is that
still a mystery?
Speaker 2 (02:17):
It's probably a mystery, Okay, I won't.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Poke on the doctor. Note, I won't poke on the
doctor date. And you ran a marathon?
Speaker 2 (02:24):
I did. How That's what I ask myself.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Do you have to train for it?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
I did, and it was probably one of the hardest
things I've ever done. Yeah, but I did it.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
What happens when you've done it? What happens then?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
Do you go, Well, you get a T shirt, you
get some bananas at the end, and you go that
was worthwhile. I'm so glad I did that. Everything hurts.
But look, I've got a banana.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
I hope you've put that banana on the wall. Like
the current at the NGV, there's a banana duct taped
to a wall at the moment.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Yeah, that's my banana.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Oh, I see, I see our thoughts. So I thought.
So I'm gonna ask you three questions, and from the
answers to those three questions, I have to try and
work out what it is you're concealing from me today,
Miss doctor Joe. Okay, all right, So the first question
I have for you is what was your favorite board
game growing up?
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Well, that would probably have to be Cludo Cludo.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Okay, Now that's the one where it's like mister Murder Mystery.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
It is Miss Scarlet and the Library with the Dagger.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Wow. I've actually never played Cludo because I feel like
there's too much reading involved. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (03:36):
I like reading?
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Yeah, well that's good. Do you have any tips for Cludo?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
You just have to write down the answers as you go, okay,
and then you can systematically work it out.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Systematically. That's a big word today, Joe. All Right, I
can't spell that. I've just written s y. I'll remember
what that means. Okay, Cludo cludo, butana doctor doctor banana cludo. Okay,
so I've got so far. Question number two, if you
could pick one obscure instrument to be proficient at, what
would it be?
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Well, I would definitely have to be the organ.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Oh my goodness, the organ. Now. I see a little
glint in your eye when you say organ, and something
tells me you're not talking about the musical instrument. I
don't know. It's a viber picking up.
Speaker 2 (04:28):
I could be wronging all sorts of organs.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Yeah, like electric ones. One's a blow, a lot of
a ones. You're with blood organ, all right, banana organ,
dr Marathon Okay, new Zealand.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
The final question after you is if you could get
the answer to one question, what would it be?
Speaker 2 (04:54):
What happens after death?
Speaker 1 (04:56):
Wife? After death? Okay? Dead? All right? Dead banana doctor organ,
New Zealand, dead bananas, get rid of banana. That's a
red herring. Cludo mystery mystery, mystery, murder mystery because I'm
obviously picking up organ, which is like body things included,
which is like murder. But then life after death and
(05:20):
that I don't know what that means. All right now
I'm going dead things, things that go inside dead things
and dead people. I love that. Are you a moutician?
Speaker 2 (05:34):
I am a forensic pathologist. I perform autopsies and work
closely with the coroner to determine the cause of death
in certain cases with closed you were.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
It wasn't a banana. Did you know? When I was
a kid, I always wanted to be a forensic pathologist. Well, literally,
I did work experience, not with the actual dead bodies,
but I went and worked and was looking at cells
and stuff for every Oh my goodness, how niche ah
ah close but those cinger. No, Joe is not a mortician,
(06:09):
she is a forensic pathologists. Close iwit's close. I don't
want to name more. Please Okay, So we hear with
Joe the forensic pathologist. Oh my goodness, did you wash
your hands today? Ah? Good question, no comment, all right.
(06:36):
So for people that don't know what a forensic pathologist is,
please explain it to us here.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
So, a forensic pathologist is a medical doctor who specializes
in forensic pathology. Now, pathology itself is the study of disease,
it causes, how you diagnose it, And a forensic pathologist
in particular has interest in injuries, how they're caused, how
they might cause death or contribute to death.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
So to become a forensic pathologist, do you have to do?
What's the pipeline to forensic pathology? How do you get there?
How do you start working with living things dead things?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
It's pretty diverse. For most of us. You do your
medical degree and then go in and work in the hospitals,
and for some people they love that, for some of
us not so much. And you develop an interest in pathology,
which is all about problem solving and diagnosing disease and
getting to the bottom of things, which is part of
the perks of the job. And then from there, for me,
(07:33):
it evolved from surgical training, loving pathology, combining the two
and doing forensic pathology, and once you get in you
realize it is one of the best jobs in the world.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
Because you are doing a real life Cludo.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
It is. It is a real life Cluto.
Speaker 1 (07:49):
Now, did you see a big mass intake in the
forensic pathology and biomedical science world thanks to shows like
CSI and NCI and Law and Order.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
It's definitely helped increase the visuals on our job and
people know what it is. People know what we do,
and I think it has increased the interest. Also, then
when people realize it's thirteen to sixteen years of medical
and specialist training, then the interest sort of drops off
from there.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Look, I'll said earlier, I wanted to be a forensic pathologist,
look at me now. Didn't quite make it. But you
know what, that's fine. At least we've got you in
the world. But I think that's an issue that happened
too with the shows like CSAs. People think the person
just does everything. They're like, oh, they're going to be
going spraying for the blood over there, and then they're
going to be in the lab do it cutting people.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Up, and they think that we do it in six
inch stilettos and miniskirts.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Do you actually do autopsies yes? Is that like your
main specialty that you're like, all right, bring them in.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
Yeah. It's one of the tools that we've got to
investigate death. So we have many We have our medical knowledge,
what we read from the medical records or from the circumstances.
We have a CT scan and soon to be an
MRI scan so we can get radiology imaging of the deceased.
And we have autopsies, which enables us to examine everything internally,
(09:14):
look for diseases, abnormalities, injuries, see what's going on on
the inside.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Would your scans would they be preferable because they're non
intrusive for some people, or is most time you're like,
we just got to get in there and have a squiz.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
It really depends on the case a lot of the time,
and I think societally there's less comfort with autopsies and
internal examinations. Autopsies have a bit of a bad reputation,
but what they really are is exploratory surgery. It enables
us to go in and find out what's wrong, gives
us information. But in many cases, the CT gives us
that information. If there's a motor vehicle accident, we can
(09:50):
see the injuries. We can see the fractures or the bleeding,
and in about half of our cases that are reported
to the coroner, they don't need a full autopsy.
Speaker 1 (10:00):
Are you studying to be a surgeon or specializing in
sur gin practices? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (10:07):
So when I was at medical school, I always wanted
to do surgery. That's what I wanted, And then got
out of medical school, got on the surgical training program,
did the first part exams, and the more I did it,
the less I liked it. And I was getting to
that stage where like many junior doctors, I was tired, jaded,
just completely burnt out. And I thought, I'll take a
(10:29):
year off do pathology because these pathologists walk into the room.
And there was one in his jeans and his leather
jacket and he seemed really smart and really cool, and
I thought about it, no more than he looks neat,
I'll go and hang out in that department for a year.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
That's all it takes.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
Loved it so much I never went back to surgery.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
Right, I guess you'd at the end of the day.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
So I get to do surgery still, but I don't
have to worry about things working again afterwards.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
So I think I'm a bit of a different person
in that this stuff doesn't give me the eg or
does it make me feel uncomfortable. I think death is
a really difficult topic for a lot of people to grasp.
Have you ever suffered a bit of I don't know,
stigma against your job and your profession and what you do.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Yeah, I think people are in equal parts fascinated by
it and can't understand how you can do it as
a job. There is definitely stigma. A lot of it
comes from my fellow medical practitioners. They don't understand why
you wouldn't want to be in a hospital dealing with patients.
Whereas I say, I still get to deal with patients,
but I also get to deal with police and doctors
(11:35):
and lawyers and all sorts of people, which is really
fun and diverse and an interesting part of the job.
And the stigma and he comes when people don't understand
what it is, when we realize it's actually medicine. It's
finding answers for families. I mean, where the deceased last doctor?
Speaker 1 (11:53):
That's true.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
We get to explain what happened. It's a really privileged
position to be the first person in some cases to know,
so what happened to this person and what they went
through and to be able to provide answers and explain that.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Yeah, totally not to lead into that stigma, but has
anything spooky happened? Any ghosts?
Speaker 2 (12:14):
We just employ them as part of the stuff.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Good. Yeah, good, you're like, well, why are you here?
Can you just hand me that over there please?
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Most of the creepy things would be creepy crawleyes.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Oh really, well, that's the thing. So you would get patients.
Do you call them patients or do you call them
We call them the deceased. You would get the deceased
in lots of different circumstances and what's the word condition conditions? Yes,
you get them in all different types of conditions. So
(12:48):
what could this range? With someone who just looks like
they've fallen asleep or someone that is covered in bugs.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Absolutely, we get everything, particularly in summertime when it's a
lot hotter. Oh yeah, is decomposed a lot faster in
the heat. But then there's the winter time phenomenon where
people die in bed with their electric blankets on. Ah,
and the heat's not so great. They don't look like
they've just fallen asleep. So yeah, we get a real
range and you learn to expect and see what you find.
Speaker 1 (13:19):
Is there a favorite time of year to work? Is
there one peer where you're like everyone that comes in
is genuinely pleasant to work with.
Speaker 2 (13:27):
Public holidays and school holidays because everyone goes out of Victoria.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
That's true, Like no one here.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
It all quietens down.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
Are you so you're working for Like, would you work
with the police? Does that mean you have to go
to court?
Speaker 2 (13:43):
It does?
Speaker 1 (13:44):
It does.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
So there's always somebody on call twenty four to seven.
So if there's a homicide or a suspicious death, we
can go out to the scene for that, or we'll
do the autopsy for that. And so we work closely
with the police from that point of view. And yes,
we go to court probably ten times or so for
giving evidence for those cases. Is that annoying, No, it's
(14:05):
part of the job that just every day.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
If you're lying, we're going to ask our other specialist person.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
Oh, we certainly get that from defense lawyers. They call
you miss to try and downplay it, play the games,
but we know the games and you just don't let
it get to you.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
So that also means in my head, you're just working
at wherever you work. But do you have to go
out to actual crime scenes as well? Sometimes we do.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
We don't get to go to anywhere near as many
as we'd like. But it's come on, well, if it's
in a scenic location, it's true. Ice cream on the
way back.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
I know that is true. Once you've done your job,
that is true.
Speaker 2 (14:45):
Not an ice s cream on the way there that
would be performed.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Do you ever still get surprised? Are there some things
or if you feel like you've pretty much seen it
all now?
Speaker 2 (14:54):
Yeah, there's not a lot now that human imagination can
think of to do that makes me think, really, because
I've said that so many times that I just think, okay,
well we'll roll with that. I won't think about that
too hard, and we'll just go with what we've got.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, in your first years where they're like, oh okay, yep.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
Yes, definitely, humans are very creative, and the weird and
wonderful things that we can do to ourselves we can
do to other people. Often things that start with a
group of blokes with beer and someone saying, hey, guys,
watch this, it'll be awesome. Often ends not so well.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
The lad's the lad's the lads.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
Luckily I'm not one of them exactly.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
I'm one of the gals. Are there any high profile
cases you've worked on that you probably can't talk about,
but maybe you could like allude to. Are the ones
that I'm winking, by the.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
Way, the ones that always get get mentioned. That I
was fortunate, unfortunate enough to be on call for was
the tragedies of Euridicity Dixon and i am Asawe. I
was on call for both of those cases. When those
poor young ladies came to us, they shocked me. I
(16:11):
didn't mean to be flippant with my answer before, but
there are still cases that do shock you. And that
was them, the randomness, the degree of injury, and there
are still cases which do impact you. We may be
able to approach a number of cases in a scientific way,
(16:31):
but there are still some where you think, no, I'm
still human, I'm still a member of this community, and
I don't think that's okay.
Speaker 1 (16:38):
Yeah. So, which brings me to my next question is
you obviously deal with a lot of heavy and impactful situations.
How do you deal with that.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
Our workplace is very proactive with that, with offering support,
whether it's something formal and regular that you want, whether
it's something on a as you need it basis, but
also that informal support we have from having a great
bunch of pathologists. There's sixteen of us. We're a wonderful
bunch of people and we're a very tight team, and
(17:10):
that support that everyone gives each other is one of
the most invaluable things. And getting through these cases where
you can go into a colleagues's office and just say
had a bit of a rough case and they'll understand
and you can talk it through. And that might just
be going out for a cup of coffee, might be
going out for something a bit stronger. But having that
support and that friendship in the group is one of
(17:32):
the key things. But certainly the employer is really proactive.
They recognize that everyone is at risk.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Is there ever a circumstance where you can't work out
the cause of death and you can't work out what's happened?
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Yeah, probably about under five percent of cases we'd have
it where the cause of death is not able to
be ascertained or determined. Despite everything that we can do,
and there's a number of reasons for that. Times it's
because the body is in a state of decomposition and
we've just lost data because it's decomposed. Sometimes it's young
(18:08):
people that die, and it's often commonly in young people
because the cause is not something structural in the heart
or the lungs, or the brain or any of the
other organs. It's something genetic that causes the heart not
to function properly or the brain not to function properly
in cause seizures. And so we work really closely with
the Children's hospital with Royal Melbourne Hospital and the geneticists
(18:30):
and the cardiologists there to get the person and their
family looked at and tested because these things can run
in families, so it's really important to get them followed
up to prevent deaths in the future. So unascertained as
a cause of death doesn't necessarily mean I don't know.
It means I haven't found anything anatomically wrong, or there's
(18:50):
nothing in the toxicology or the biochemistry or on the
CT scan, but I suspect there's something else going on
and it may be genetic, and we refer the families
off in that case when is.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
The cutoff point for you to stop trying to work
it out? They all right, put it down, Love, Come on, Joe,
We've got to move on.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
I think it depends on the case. The younger the
person is, the more you're going to do for them,
because you really know that it's important to get to
the bottom of it.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
I was listing something the other day and they'd found
remains like six to twelve months later and they could
still work out the cause of death from it. How
does that? That is the craziest puzzle in the world.
How do you How do you look at a stack
of bones and go, oh, yeah, this happened.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Hell depends. There can actually still be quite a lot
of information you can get. There might even after six
to twelve months, there might be little bits of soft
tissue left that can give you clues. Or if it's
an injury that's damaged the bone. We work closely with
anthropologists who are experts in looking at bones, looking at abnormalodies,
and they can help us to tell if that bone
(19:54):
e injury is something that happened after death, or you know,
from animal scavenging or something. I guess if it's something
happened before so you can actually still get a lot
of information. And those are the cases we actually do
spend a lot of time on, because paradoxically, the less
of a person you have, the longer it takes to
look at everything and try and figure it out.
Speaker 1 (20:15):
Does it feel like making the world a better place?
How do you feel about that?
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Well, apart from skipping out of the office each day
with you know, bluebirds and rainbows and haply singing a
happy tune. No, it's a wonderful job. It's really rewarding.
Every day is different. Yeah, I mean I get to
come and chat with you.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Oh pretty good, isn't it. I get to go to court,
I get to.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
Go to the crime scenes. It's a really rewarding job.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
Yeah, you know. I like what I do. But you
literally help people, ash, I didn't think i'd walk out
feeling bad about myself today. To close out, I want
to see if you can give you a hypothetical situation,
and if you give me a few clues as to
something you might be finding during an autopsy, and I
want to see if I can determine the cause of death.
(21:05):
I'll work out I'm going to be Pluto person. I
get my pen ready. Is there a banana involved? There is? Okay,
all right, okay, okay with you all right.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
So we have a because I'm a new Zealander, he'll
have to be sixty six, okay, sixty six year old man?
Speaker 1 (21:20):
Yes, I like that.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
Was eating a banana and he developed heaviness in his chests,
collapsed and couldn't be resuscitated.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Okay, right, couldn't be blown.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
He's got high blood pressure okay, diabetes, and he smokes
and he hasn't been to the gym.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
I can't believe it ever describing my father like this.
This is so embarrassing. No, I don't have fun anyway, Okay, okay.
So he's unhealthy. He's pretty unhealthy. Bad cholesterol, yes, probably undoubtedly, Yeah,
bad cholesterol, high blood pressure, eating banana. I think the
banana's red herring again. Actually, he died because he finally
(22:07):
had something healthy to eat. His body went into shock.
He's been eating chicken nuggets his whole life, and he
had the banana and his body was like what this?
And then he felt heavy and dropped to the ground.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
Did I sorted? Solved? Solved?
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Did he have a heart attack? Yes, because of the banana.
I can't wait to do my internship for the second time.
I'll stick it the whole way through this time. She's
got to fix the lighting. I hate fluorescent lightings. Ah,
and I think the moral to this story is don't
(22:47):
trust bananas, and I'll take that to the bank. You've
been listening to an iHeart Australia production concealed with Art Simone.
Listen to more of what you love on iHeart and
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