IWD - Dr Michelle Atchison

Q: How did you gain your confidence to take on leadership roles in medicine?

A: Leadership roles have been a little easier for me in psychiatry, where the gender balance is more equal and being a female psychiatrist is a very wanted status in our profession. Most women, and many men, prefer to see a female psychiatrist. I’ve nearly always felt supported by my colleagues when I have stepped up to roles, although there have been challenging males who have tried to explain a job to me that I am doing pretty well. I’ve always seen that as their problem, not mine. A lot of my personality and my training has been about building relationships, and I think that has been my strength in any leadership position.

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Q:?What’s the greatest risk you have taken from a career perspective?

A: As far as risks go, I was on the path to be an academic psychiatrist when I was overlooked for a job because, in part, I wanted to work part time with a young baby. I found myself without a job and had to decide where my career would take me. I started private practice psychiatry and it was the best decision I ever made for work life balance. Perhaps not for my Super balance.???

One of the major challenges in my leadership positions, for example as our Psychiatry College SA chair for 6 years and now AMA SA president, has been doing those positions from private practice. As others in private practice would know, if you don’t see patients you don’t earn money. So every in hours meeting, every day taken off to fly interstate for a meeting, is time you can’t earn an income. It is difficult to sit around a table with other colleagues or specialists who have public positions where time off does not incur this problem. I have been lucky that my husband is also a specialist, but I know he can be annoyed with the amount of time I am away and working pro-bono. I have slowly chipped away at the voice of private practice in my College, and that is my aim in AMA meetings as well.

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Q:?How do you unplug from work???

A: One of my ways of decompressing is to travel (for fun, not meetings) and covid had put a stop on that. Just before covid I had been to Barcelona and was hoping to do more of the Mediterranean coast. So that’s where I hope to go again in the not-too-distant future. At this point, even getting on a plane for 12 hours sounds like bliss. I love to read, so that helped me though covid. Anything science fiction or fantasy is a good escape.?