Imaging Journeys: How a Schoolyard Hustle Shaped a Health Tech Innovator with Prof. Ram Senasi

"AI might be transforming the landscape of medical diagnostics, but an algorithm still can't give an anxious parent a hug."

Welcome to a very special episode of Imaging Journeys, dropping just in time for UKIO 2026. In alignment with this year’s conference theme—putting humanity at the centre of healthcare in the age of the machine—host Aidan Pearce sits down with the wonderfully insightful Professor Ram Senasi. 

Ram is a Paediatric Radiologist, health tech innovator, and a fierce advocate for keeping empathy at the absolute core of medical practice. In this wide-ranging, humorous, and deeply moving conversation, Ram shares how his early life shaped a completely unique approach to leadership, technology, and patient care. 

From a covert schoolboy McDonald's syndicate in Malaysia to a pandemic-era mission to democratise healthcare by launching remote robotic surgery training in the Caribbean, Ram’s journey proves that the best solutions always come back to one thing: taking people with you. 

Inside this episode, we unpack:

• The Schoolboy Hustle: The hilarious (and highly strategic) origin story of Ram’s teenage fast-food operation, and the enduring business lessons it taught him about communication, distribution, and identifying a market. 
• Democratizing Surgical Tech: How Ram and his team bypassed pandemic travel restrictions to remotely train surgeons and deploy affordable robotic surgery tools in emerging economies. 
• Why AI Can’t Hug: A touching, real-world reflection from a pediatric ultrasound clinic that perfectly illustrates the irreplaceable role of the human healer. 
• The Power of Prompting & Data: Why the future of radiology isn't about finding answers- it's about learning how to ask the right questions in the age of quantum computing and AI. 
• Multigenerational Success & Failure: Humbling advice passed down from Ram’s parents on treating every single person as a mentor and looking at failure as your best friend. 

Whether you’re a clinical professional navigating the rise of AI or a MedTech leader looking to build a legacy, this conversation is a powerful reminder that curiosity and compassion are our greatest assets. 

Heading to the conference? You can catch Professor Ram Senasi in person throughout UKIO 2026 at the Fujifilm Healthcare stand. Stop by to discuss the future of imaging, innovation, and keeping humanity at the heart of the clinic.

Connect with Us:

• Host: Aidan Pearce 
• Brought to you by: Ellew MedTech Talent – Specialist recruitment for technical, commercial, and leadership professionals in medical imaging and MedTech. 
• Subscribe: Don't forget to follow Imaging Journeys on your favourite podcast app so you never miss an episode!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to the fourth episode of the Imaging Journeys podcast series. I'm your host, Aidan Pierce, and this series is brought to you by Elu Med Tech Talent. We're dropping this special episode just in time for UKIO 2026. And the conversation you're about to hear couldn't be more aligned with this year's theme: putting humanity at the centre of healthcare in the age of the machine. Today I'm joined by Professor Ram Sanasi, a pediatric radiologist, health tech innovator, and a massive advocate for the human touch in medicine. We cover everything from his brilliant origin story involving a cover McDonald's syndicate and its boarding school to his pioneering work, democratising healthcare by bringing robotic surgery to emerging economies during the pandemic. But that's cool. This episode is about people. Ram reminds us that my mind big data are incredibly exciting and will inevitably transform diagnostics. An algorithm still can't give an anxious parent a hug. It's a powerful perspective, and my empathy must remain at the heart of health tech. If you're heading to UK this year, be sure to catch Ram. He will be at the Fujifilm Healthcare Stand from the Conference. There's so much that he's got uh in experience and um and and he's an all-round good guy to chat too. So um we're gonna get started with this. This is my conversation with Professor Ram Sanasi. I hope you enjoy it. Tell me about your school McDonald's business.

SPEAKER_01 1:37

Everyone knows how to meet about the school McDonald's business. Um I'd like to say it's the illegal McDonald's business I had at school. So I was um I'm so I grew up in Malaysia, uh, and I was one of the fortunate kids who got sent to an English boarding school. And um I grew up with a lot of kids who had lots of money and spare cash. Uh, one of the traditions at the school is every two or three weeks we have something called Axiat, which means we're allowed to go home for the weekend. But one particular weekend, my parents decided to go away on their own, which I I fully appreciate. Yeah, uh, so I was um I stayed at school. And so usually a few of the kids stay. Some kids just, you know, the parents live overseas, so uh they stay at school. And one of my friends came up the idea and said, Hey, look, you know, we're really, really hungry and we don't really bought a school food. Uh, should we just order some McDonald's? And I said, Wow, that's a great idea, you know. Who doesn't want McDonald's? So we found a local, the closest local McDonald's place, just up the road from us, about an hour's drive. And um, I called the uh the manager and I said, Hey, can we put in an order for McDonald's? And he said, Yeah, as long as the minimum of 300 ringgit, which is about 50 pounds UK money. And uh, we put the order in and food came, and we we have 300 ringgit worth of McDonald's from from all the kids, you know, who stayed back. Now, while we're eating it, um, my friend said, Oh, we should do this next time. I said, Absolutely. So the next time, same thing happened. But when it happened again, uh, I said, you know what, we could we could do something with this. And so we started uh thinking, how are we going to actually operationalize uh McDonald's getting it out over the weekend? So I actually contacted the manager. I actually went down to the town and spoke. I said, Look, could I have some copies of your menus and could we get some orders in? He says, Yeah, absolutely fine. Went to school, uh, went back to school, went to the computer lab, scanned all the um the menu items. We repriced it by adding in the VAT and all the taxes. We um we didn't sell McValue meals, we sold them all separately so we could actually increase our margin. And this is a 14-year-old, 15-year-old kid, right? And um we publicized it, and then we have about we had we had the boarding houses, and within each boarding house had the more the more junior guys, call them a minions, to to sort of sell it. So if you talk about gig economy, I think I started in the early 90s, and all they wanted was a free McVeigh meal, which was brilliant. Um, we had about five or six cycles of selling McDonald's, and we we we we had an operation in place. We were taking orders and the food was coming, we had people handing out the meals. This was a bunch of secondary school students doing it, and uh it became quite successful. I was actually making a decent amount of money, and you know, talk about child labor. I think it's fine since I was a child too. But uh, and of course, you know, I'm against child labor, just checking the audience. Um, it it got so successful that uh the school camp team made a complaint to the to the principal. Yeah, because uh nobody was going on a Sunday, because we only did this on a Sunday. So nobody went in on a Sunday to uh to eat food, so they're throwing all this food away. So the principal called me to Zobby said, Look, I absolutely love this idea, but I'm forced to close you down. I'm like, oh that that's a real pity because you know, all the kids like it. Says, look, you know, I'm for one, really up for all you're doing. Um, but you know, we're gonna have to shut you down. I said, uh, okay, fine. You know, so we had a really good run, uh, I think about six or seven cycles of sales. I made some good money. Um, then a few months later, um it sprung up again. Uh, but this time it was sold by uh as as part of a fundraiser uh to try uh to increase funds for the cookery club. Okay. Um but I was the president of the cookery club and they said, you know, how can we raise money? I said, Well, I've got an idea. I've got an idea. I approached the business club and the business and the business club's like, no, you know, we're way too big to be doing this with you, Ram. I said, Okay, fine, I'll just do it myself. So the cookery club ended up making 10 times more that year than the business club on this McDonald's sale. So we ran it for about two or three cycles, and then again the principal called enough the fact that you can't go under a different banner to sell your McDonald's. Uh, but it was just a great experience. I think it just taught me about you know uh tenacity and just finding ways to work around the system in a legal way. Um, but I think it's one of those sort of origin stories about me just, you know, and what I do now, I can kind of trace it back to the McDonald's business.

SPEAKER_00 6:20

You showed that entrepreneurial spirit.

SPEAKER_01 6:23

Yeah, I I think I found a market, I found a way to distribute, and it just taught me a lot. Uh, and I kind of those lessons learned, and that's what I'm doing now.

SPEAKER_00 6:32

What do you think you learned particularly what like in that experience that you probably still use now?

SPEAKER_01 6:37

There's always a way to solve a problem. You just need to take a step back. And sometimes you just need some time and say, okay, there is a problem. I'm gonna take a step back. And and how am I going to solve this? Well, what are the barriers that I need to get over? The key part, I think, uh excellent communication skills, I think. You know, you've got to get people in your journey. And when you talk about in a business today and taking people on a journey, that's what I had to do with all the more junior members of the school. I had to take them on a journey, getting them to sell the McDonald's, take the orders, distribute them for me. This was way before Amazon, to be, if you think about it, right? Um, and then to then convince them that a McVanny meal was an appropriate amount of payment. Now, from an ethical point of view, yes, of course, I wouldn't be repeating some of that. But it is about taking people on the journey of an idea and knowing what your client wants, what your customers wants. And that's the listening part. You're going to have all sorts of challenges if you're trying to set something up. You just try to solve it. And if you can't, talk to people who can help you solve it. And when you have roadblocks, look for alternatives. For me, my first roadblock was I can't do this personally, but I'm still passionate, I want to learn about it. So I found a legal way to do it through the cookery club. And the second thing is you're going to have doors closed at you. I, you know, approached the business society. Uh, they were the guys that were meant to be making money. They they shut me up because they said, look, you know, this is not something we do, and you know, you're too small for us. We ended up making more money that year compared to them. So just because somebody bigger than you says no, doesn't mean you can't just do it yourself. And sometimes you might prove them wrong.

SPEAKER_00 8:16

Yeah, definitely. What uh what cultural and personal anchors from your childhood still ground you?

SPEAKER_01 8:25

I would say, like the UK, Malaysia is a multicultural society. And where I went to school, uh it was quite very multicultural. We had kids from all over the world. We all had different ideas and insights. We all came from different religious backgrounds, different cultural backgrounds, dietary preferences, but we all found a way to to coexist and work together. And I think Malaysia's taught me about that, about that we may all have differences, but there's a way that we can communicate, we can align ourselves. And that has been instrumental in the work I do, not only in the UK, but globally. It's trying to meet someone halfway and finding out where can we align and what we can agree on to start this conversation. There's going to be differences, but immediately what we can agree on, then we'll start from there. The second thing to me, I mean, it's uh it's my mom. My mom really grounds me. And a lot of people probably uh link a lot of that growth, you know, if they're fortunate enough as I was to have two parents at home. Uh and I know some people don't have that privilege, but I had that privilege. My mom was instrumental. She taught me about reading the room, treating people with respect. She's always told me, you know, always walk into a room that you've got a million dollars in your pocket. And uh and she knew I wasn't the smartest kid in on the block. I wasn't doing very well at class. Only now I realize why, how my brain works. But she always just said, just because you have those limitations doesn't mean you can't be successful. And uh she's a lot older now, but I still give my mama a call every few days. And whenever I'm sort of unsure of anything, she keeps me grounded. She reminds me of where we come from. The second person, of course, is my dad. My dad came from abstract poverty. You know, I I did a post on LinkedIn, you know, he went to school uh without souls and issues, and he didn't have enough money to buy snacks, he would drink from the toilet tap to to fill his stomach. But he um he worked really hard, joined the Malaysian army, did really, really well. But he he reminded he reminds me of where we come from. And one of the things my dad always says to me is, you know, a lot can happen in one generation. Our family became successful in one generation per se, because for where he came from, you know, it it was a fantastic tale of poverty going to riches, and he became a highly respected person in the army. He's now sort of knighted in Malaysia, he's got a title. But he says the same way a lot can happen in a generation of a family being successful. He also says a lot can happen in a generation for a family to fall down. So I always remember that that yes, I could be someone today, but in one generation, all of it could be lost. So that keeps me grounded and reminds me to treat everyone with respect. Because uh I always remind my registrars, you know, we you know, we're in the NHS, we might have you know cleaners coming to a room, and I always make sure that we're polite to them because I always remind my registrars one day your child might be working for that person's child. And a lot can happen there. So for me, that's what keeps me grounded, that how generations can change just like that.

SPEAKER_00 11:45

Thinking multi-generational within families, how do you see success and failure playing out across generations? What's one pattern you've observed or experienced in your own family that shapes how you approach leadership and mentorship today?

SPEAKER_01 12:00

For me, I like to think multi-generational. And you when you look at success and failure, it's looking at it across generations because within that, there's going to be failures, there's going to be success, but you have to think of the long game from a personal point of view, just for my own family's lessons. My dad's had failures and less uh failures and success. So is my mom, so so have I. And you have to let your children know that this happens in life, but the main aim is to continuously progressing as a family. And whatever I do today, it's not for myself, it's actually for my children and my grandchildren. And that can be said the same for society. We in a post-pandemic world, we've realized how generations can be impacted by just one key event that happened. This was one of those defining moments uh in our society. And you can see the impact across generations when you talk about long COVID and all the impact of the sort of the healthcare impact that's, you know, that's caused by COVID. So when we're thinking about solutions today, when we're thinking about ways we treat people in healthcare, when we talk about AI, we're not talking about for our generation. We're actually developing the solutions for either the next generation or the generation after. And a lot of people are fearful of AI, AI taking over their jobs. But one of our greatest threats right now is population collapse, climate change, supply chain dicha disruption, and uncontrolled uh poverty. So when you when you factor all of this together, in a in a few generations from now, there's not going to be enough of us around to do the work that we're normally doing now. So there is no threat because there's not many of us around. So I always tell people, if you're actually worried about AI taking over your jobs, there's only one solution, and that's it, go out and make more babies. Then we don't have to worry about AI. And so the work that I'm putting in now, not just in AI, but in technology and innovation, is actually to make sure that the generations that follow have systems in place to allow them to also thrive. So they are able to do what they need to do. And a successful society three generations from now may not be scientists, they may be philosophers and artists and and and historians. So that's how I see thinking multi-generationally. We're doing what we're doing today is for the next generation following us.

SPEAKER_00 14:35

You um specialized in pediatric radiology at quite an early stage in your career. What was it about imaging uh children's health that hooked you? What was that initial spark? Um how's that spark evolved over your career?

SPEAKER_01 14:51

It's an interesting question because I I came into medicine thinking I was gonna be a surgeon. My dad's a surgeon, so culturally that was the path I was gonna take. And when I came to the UK uh in 2003, my path was I'm gonna get into surgical training. And I got into surgical training, then I realized surgery wasn't for me. It it took a certain degree, a certain aptitude to be a surgeon, and I knew what my limitations were. But radiology really, really attracted me. So I got into radiology thinking I'd go into interventional radiology, but somehow I got exposed to pediatric radiology. Uh, pardon the pun exposed, but uh there was something about it that really, really attracted me. Now, in the simplest form, I would say um although a lot of people see pediatric radiology as a subspecialty, it's actually a generalist specialty. Within the world of pediatric radiology, I'm actually a general radiologist. It's just that from the outside I'm a specialist. The second thing I like about pediatric imaging is it's maybe I'm just a child at heart. I like communicating with children. I am an extrovert, so I'm very comfortable singing while I'm doing an ultrasound scan or wearing colorful clothing. And so I work with really, really um, you know, great people that enjoy working with children. Plus, children don't choose to get sick. And so there's this part of me that we have this duty to protect children. And for me, pediatric imaging is one of the last areas where there's just for me real medicine. I work with some fantastic clinicians in my hospital. You know, uh uh alongside my pediatric radiology team, and there's uh five of us, we've grown significantly. Interestingly, we've just been uh nominated for the HSG awards for what we've done in the last two years. But we work with amazing surgeons and amazing uh pediatricians and neonatologists, and it's to me it's old school medicine. They've actually seen the patient, they've done all the investigations, and it's a very sensible conversation. So I think the pediatric radiology or the pediatric world is filled with such amazing people that it makes my job actually really, really easy. Yes, there's going to be a lot of sometimes bad news and unfortunate news, and seeing children with diseases that you can't really help them with uh can be a bit distressing. But fortunately, we don't see much of it purely because of the advances of technology and the way we treat cancers. But if I can play a part in making that journey comfortable and giving the parents comfort, then at least I've done something positive, even when things don't look so bright for them. So for me, pediatrics it really is the people. But I just love working with children. I think children are amazing. Their parents are the nicest people, but uh and the clinicians and the team I work with makes pediatric radiology to me one of the more exciting specialties to get into.

SPEAKER_00 17:55

Yeah, it's um it's interesting talking hearing you talking about um pediatrics and children's health, and you know, as as a dad of two young boys and you know, here you're talking about you know diseases and fortunately you know the boys are both um very well currently. Um but um but yeah, you just it's something you kind of you're very aware of it that you're fortunate in that position and um hopefully it stays that way you know. Absolutely. Um what experiences, decisions, or opportunities have guided the evolution of your career, career beyond pediatric radiology into broader roles, collaborations, and impact across healthcare?

SPEAKER_01 18:40

I think there are sort of two moments for me. And it and the sort of what device and board is actually COVID. So pre-COVID, um I was very interested in in healthcare, of course, and I became a pediatric radiologist and had fantastic training in uh Alberta Children's Hospital, and I came back to the UK and was establishing myself as uh a pediatric radiologist and a general radiologist, and you know, challenges along the way as you grew as a new consultant. Uh, but I was also interested in education and uh and and and in conferences and events, so uh that's kind of some of the stuff I did before COVID. Then COVID happened. Then there was a loss of purpose in some sense, and a lot of us felt that, especially clinicians who are used to seeing patients or doing work. And uh the way we worked and how we worked changed for a lot of us. Some of us sat back, I think, and just took it as it was. For me, it was just, I think, serendipitous. I think there was a few telephone calls that happened, and I realized actually I could potentially change things and change my trajectory, not just with not within healthcare, not only just in healthcare, but outside healthcare. And the work I did pre-COVID in sort of uh creating a network and getting involved with LinkedIn and social media sort of helped with that. And I just realized that I could use a lot of the experiences to go outside healthcare or at least standard medical practice, and that's how I got involved in uh developing uh robotic surgery. And you know, uh I started an organization called Imperial Medical Solutions with uh two colleagues. One of them is actually one of my old surgical bosses, and he actually uh grabbed me by my arms, well, you know, very politely. He wasn't abusive, of course. You know, it's just a more of a gentle nudge. And he says, Ram, you're gonna hurt someone if you don't change your attitude, you know, and he was a very strict surgeon, and that that stuck with me. But we ended up working together because you know, we grew together. And one of our projects was uh developing robotic surgery, and and I can talk a bit more about that, but that then just opened up doors for further opportunities. And I realized actually you just have to just do as much as you can. And if you are not successful financially, well, are you successful by widening your network if you learn something new? And that just became a snowball effect, and it just progressed and progressed, and I just found myself exposing myself to all these new experiences and all these different people just through increasing my network, and that's how I find myself today. So, my seminal moment, I think, was when I decided during COVID, I can't just sit in my house anymore. I needed to connect with people, and so the way I connected it was coming up with new projects, and I learned so much. But I think what I'm most fortunate about is during all this time, the people I connected with, people like yourself and all the people I'm not currently working with, as I've all you know played an instrumental part to where I am today.

SPEAKER_00 21:58

In building Imperial. Imperial medical solutions, what breakthrough are you most proud of that's redefining healthcare delivery? And how does it address real-world inefficiencies you've seen in radiology?

SPEAKER_01 22:10

So, probably not radiology, but at least in healthcare. I would like to say Imperial Medical Solutions was one of my successful failures. It was one of the first things I got involved in. I had zero experience in international relations, had zero experience in surgical robotics. Um, I knew nothing about financial margins and uh I didn't even know what the word KOL meant, key opinion leader. But I just thought I'm just gonna I'm just gonna learn it. But the the the problem was simple. How do we get robotic surgery into emerging economies? Now, the technology that I dealt with uh is 20 times cheaper than uh the big machines we see today. And the CEO approached myself and my colleagues and said, Look, can you help us expand the market? And when I looked at the technology, it just occurred to me, and I said, if I'm allowed to say this on podcasts, but I told the CEO, this is actually the AK-47 of the robotic surgery world. He says, he was a bit troubled by this. So, what do you mean? I said, Well, it's cheap, it's easily deployable, easy to train, and easy to fix. What more do you need? You know. So I said, You're going for the wrong market. This is for emerging economies where they can't afford all these technologies, but they still want to do robotics. This is going to be that bridge. So I use all my contacts in the Caribbean and in Malaysia. And I, as a pediatric radiologist, had to sell a dream of robotic surgery in that region. And I contacted uh colleagues in Jamaica. And of course, I went to medical school in the Caribbean, so I had people that I knew people, and I got a university sort of interested. And so we started developing a program for them. It slowed down a bit. Uh, and I said, okay, I need I need to accelerate things. So then I contacted my colleagues and friends in Trinidad and Tobago, the other big uh faculty uh within the university, the other big uh um location for the university. So three main locations: Jamaica, Trinidad, and Barbados. So Trinidad, I I kind of told the surgeon, so do you know uh Jamaica's gonna be uh the first Caribbean country to have robotic surgery? And I inadvertently started a robotic surgery race between two nations, uh, all during COVID. Uh so but so all of them wanted to be robotic surgeons, and you could train a robotic surgeon with this technology in 48 hours. And so a lot of people were like, oh, we could all be robotic surgeons, or at least in some shape. The next problem was how are we going to train them? Because we couldn't fly anyone to the Caribbean. I would love to have gone, but I couldn't. And traditionally, for complex surgical procedures, you you need to fly someone down. We couldn't do that. So there we had robots packed onto a plane, flying to two locations, Trinidad and Jamaica. And we didn't have a training solution. It felt like a scene from Apollo 13. We didn't have a re-entry procedure. Fortunately, to our context, uh, there's a really smart educationist called Hamish McKenzie, based in Norwich, and he's involved in education and healthcare. He looked at the solution and says, Look, I think there's a way we could train this remotely. He started off, I think, with about seven cameras and he brought it down to three, and we use uh consumer grade technology. And we were able to, in the Kent office, train surgeons how to use this technology based in Jamaica and Trinidad. And this was all supervised. Uh, and then we uh then had to go for live surgery. And now, how are we going to do the live surgery? So again, we had to come up with a new plan, and I had to work with the surgeons and say, okay, what's safe, what's not safe. Fortunately, uh the chief surgeon is currently um the president of the Association of Laproscopic Surgeons of Great Britain, Northern Ireland. So I had the best in my team to develop this training solution. And so we uh kind of followed what they did in America with the Apollo program. We had three teams. Each team was had four people. We had two surgeons during the robotic surgery and uh two surgeons as a relief team, and we timed everything. And uh, I think in September 2021, if not mistaken, we had the uh first robotic surgery performed in Trinidad and Tobago, three successful procedures, then followed by more complex procedures in Jamaica, and we proved that with all the adversity of uh COVID, led by someone who never did a surgical procedure in like 10 years, uh, with a great team, we were able to come up with a training solution, first ever robotic training solution to be done remotely. Uh, even though it was a small piece of kit, but we did it. And we trained, I think, 10 or 12 surgeons how to do robotic surgery. And we then replicated this in Malaysia and it worked. So, again, back to the McDonald's story. There's gonna be problems. You just need to find a way to work around it in a safe way, in an ethical way. But most importantly, it comes back to the people. You've got to take them on that journey. Why are you doing this and how you're gonna do it? Uh, but yeah, that taught me that you know technology in the right hands can do a lot of good, but you need to have a clear plan.

SPEAKER_00 27:35

It was interesting to listen to you talk about um selling uh robotics to emergent markets and uh the process of con of making contact with uh people in those countries. Um, and I could think of I was thinking of the McDonald's business at the same time, and I can see similarities between the McDonald's and the robotics, but on a much grander scale, right?

SPEAKER_01 28:00

So I was saying the McDonald's business for me was in some sense my my original story in terms of uh how Ram how Ram does crazy things. I wouldn't call it crazy, I mean it was robotic surgery on patients in the Caribbean, but you know, it was done, it was methodical. Even our press release was done a month later. We weren't too excited. We actually waited for the patients to recover, and then we had a controlled press release. Fortunately, that's when I learned about international relations. We had fantastic support from the British High Commission in Jamaica and in Trinidad and Tobago. And they they were part of that PR. And that's where I learned about PR. That's when I learned about how messaging is really, really important when you're trying to take people on the journey. So um, yes, uh I call Imperial Medical Solutions my successful failure because it it no longer exists. But it was that spark that has now helped me establish other organizations and other ventures. Some I can't reveal today, but it will be revealed in the next few months. All very, very exciting. So I think the lesson is there's always every day is a school day, there's always something to learn. And just because you fail at something doesn't mean you can't learn from it. And that is how you have to look at failure. And when I speak to a lot of successful people, and I wouldn't say I'm anywhere close to the some of the successful people out there, all of them has have redefined the way they look at failure and how what their relationship with failure is. And so, yes, things go go wrong, it happens, that's life. But how you approach that, how you look at failure and how you look at the setbacks is what's going to define your next project or the project after that. So that's the lesson I learned. In what way, commercially or professionally? Commercially, no, we were confident because we knew we had a great product. Interestingly, that company has been bought over by another company three years on. And the new company has now approached me again and said, Do you mind helping us again? So I may have left some imprint, but they bought over this company, the original company, because they knew commercially this was viable. Look, the world is unfair. You got countries with lots of money and countries without lots of money. And I've seen this through my own experiences in Malaysia, some of the volunteer work I've done in Southeast Asia and Laos, where we take a lot for granted in the UK, in in sort of uh you know, countries like the UK, Europe, uh, and the US. So there's a there is technology that can be used in countries like the UK, but may not be translatable to countries that are emerging. They just do not have the resources, they do not have the support. Some of the smaller countries, the big companies, won't even look at them because it's just not commercially viable to send one piece of kit and all the training that's required. So the technology that we had is the technology of the masses. It is the technology that other countries in the world can have access to. Why can't people in lower-income countries also have access to some sort of technology that can improve their life? This technology allowed for uh shorter procedure times, less pain. You can redeploy stuff. It's a robot that actually held a laparoscopic camera. It was a very simple technology, you know. And as a radiologist, our vision is the most important thing. Same for a surgeon operating on a patient. If you had one person holding the camera and it's wobbling and it's stretching the skin, you're gonna have longer surgery times, you're gonna have some pain and long hospital stays. This proceed this technology reduced all of that for a lot less than a big robot, surgical robot. So it's giving these countries the opportunities. It's about democratizing health care. Some technologies work for some uh environments. What I've learned is there's always a way for other countries to also have that opportunity. And that's why I'm really passionate about some of these technologies. It's giving everyone some sort of access to better care and health uh and medicine.

SPEAKER_00 32:23

What keeps you anchored to work in within pediatric radiology, especially as technology continues to transform the way healthcare is delivered and diagnostics are made?

SPEAKER_01 32:35

That's a great question. And I wouldn't even just say in pediatric radiology, I think in radiology and healthcare in general. And of course, it's a lot of people who feel threatened by technology, and everyone's talking about AI. I will I'll probably go to a story that always sticks with me. I was uh doing an ultrasound list with my registrar, and of course, a lot of our procedures are usually quite routine and standard. We're looking at kidneys and uh just the usual routine things that you'd see in a pediatric list. But sometimes we have to do cancer screening, especially children who have uh genetic um issues. So this was a scan on a baby on their first screening procedure, three months on after birth. Quite rightfully and understandably, the parents were stressed out. They were really anxious, you could see it in the eyes. So I immediately told my registrar, look, we're not gonna take too long here. Uh our registrars, they get fantastic training in hospital. We give lots of time for them to examine patients, but I knew this was not the time to do that. You have to empathize to the needs of the parents. The father, especially, was quite anxious. So I said, Look, I'm gonna do this scan. Because they must have been waiting, what, three months to find out the child had cancer or not? And that for anyone, that's very, very long days and long weekends. So I immediately did a scan and I did a quick screen. I said, Look, I can't see anything worrying. And straight away you can see them, the anxiety dropped down a notch. At the end of the study, I was able to confidently say, I can't see anything abnormal here. I reassured them and said, of course, we have to do regular screenings, but they were in the right place. And they had a right team to sort any problems if it happened. And the parents were absolutely relieved, nearly in tears, especially the father. Now I'm a dad, and I understand the burdens mothers have to carry, but so do fathers. Fathers too carry a son burden, different, but it's a burden. There is a burden that they carry inside them. Uh, but they were really, really appreciative. And it's one of those moments where I felt, you know, this is why I do what I do in pediatric radiology. Then I told my registrar, look, you can carry on with the rest of the list and call me after each patient. So I went outside. The last thing a registrar needs is a consultant looking over the shoulder. So I was making a telephone call because I think I was on call that day. Then the father and the mother then went past me. And again, the father, I think the father was just so happy and so relieved. He just wanted to thank me again. So he said, Oh, Doctor, you know, thank you so much. You know, thank you for, you know, I said, and I said, Look, don't worry about it. You know, this is my job. Uh, you're in the right place at the right time. Just go back and relax, enjoy your your baby, and don't Google anything, right? And and the dad was like really, really relieved. But I could see in his eyes, he was just there's a certain tension there, and I it was just spontaneous. And I told the dad, it was really weird. Do you need a hug? And the dad's Google, and you can see the shock in the wife's face, like you know, and the husband actually said, Yeah. The father actually helped me, and the mother was relieved, and the father then just left, just like you know, I needed that. It's a true story, and um that's when I realized AI can't hug, at least not for now. And I think that's where we have to remind ourselves we are human healers. Healthcare and doctors and nurses and all the fantastic people we have within the NHS in healthcare. Yes, we're doing a particular role right now. But we've known over the last hundreds of years, last thousands of years, our role will continuously evolve. You know, a hundred over years ago, people talk thought X-rays were uh a parlor trick. No good doctor should be able to diagnose uh a fracture using X-rays, just clinical examinations, all they needed. Eight years before that, when stethoscopes came about, people thought stethoscopes were the parlour trick because every good doctor should be able to stick their ears onto a patient's chest. Look where we are now. And the reason all of this progressed is because people stayed curious. So my role as a radiologist will evolve, roles of doctors will evolve. And the most important thing is we need to stay curious. I don't think we should feel threatened by technology, we should be part of the discussion, continuously asked questions. But to me, that's why, yes, there is a role for technology, but there will always be a role for human healer.

SPEAKER_00 37:16

Yeah, definitely. Nobody remembers how um an AI algorithm made them feel. I remember how a person that was looking after them.

SPEAKER_01 37:24

You know, don't quote me on this, but maybe maybe 50 years from now you might have robots who can hug, but nothing beats a good old human hug, I think.

SPEAKER_00 37:34

Broader reflections on imaging and AI. What excite you most what excites you most about how AI tools could redefine diagnostics?

SPEAKER_01 37:44

It's data, data, data. It's gonna change the way we look at issues. And I'm using the word issues because previously it's all about how we find answers. And we've been taught about how we look for answers. We go to med school or we we go to university, and everything is about finding the answers. It's all about mathematical equations or clinical questions and looking for answers. But with the vast amount of data we have right now, and with the rise of AI and the advent of quantum computing, it's not about how we ask questions anyway. Sorry, it's not about how we uh answer questions, it's actually how we ask questions. Because that's where the whole idea of prompting with Chat GPT comes in. Take that a few steps further. Knowing what questions to ask will get you the information, data you need to make decisions for patients. So that's what I'm excited about. There's a lot of work going into AI and some some great successes. But I think the next step is how are we going to use all this data and how we're gonna use AI to access the information that we otherwise weren't able to have access to? So to me, I think the next generation is going to be taught on how to ask questions, things that probably we don't normally do.

SPEAKER_00 39:09

Which mentor or role model has given you advice that still guides your decisions today? What is that advice? What can you tell me about that person?

SPEAKER_01 39:19

That's a really difficult question, actually. And the reason is I have come across so many amazing mentors in life. Well, I'm gonna go back again to my mother now, and the reason I say this is um I got married uh early, uh early 2000, 2004. My wife's gonna kill me now. I forgot when I got married. It was 2004 we got married. Um, we got married in the UK, and we believe you can only get married once. But my parents wanted to throw a big party in Malaysia. Now, of course, I mentioned my dad came from poverty, but he made a name for himself and became very successful. So, what was expected was uh 10 to 15 tables and a five-star hotel, a few VIPs, maybe the minister or the chief minister invited. Uh that was what's normally done. My mom did the opposite. She went and booked a whole school hall. And in Malaysia, especially the Chinese schools, because we have different denomination schools, they would have this big hall that would rent out for events. So my mom rented out one of these schools, it's called Peifong, it's still a big, fantastic school, um, for the same price, and she got it all decorated, and she invited 1,200 people. Wow. 1,200 people. Um, and it was everyone from all walks of life, and there was no dress code, there wasn't a guest, there wasn't a present list or gift list. Uh, and even my my old gardener when I was my dad was in the military, came. He came with um his best Batik shirt, a really nice pair of sandals, and his two wives, he had two wives. But he was really, really proud that he came. And and and and he was just one of many who who came from that walk of life. And I was still young and naive. And regretfully, actually, I asked my mom, why did we have it in a five-star hotel with all the with all the VIPs? Why did you want to do it so big and you know, all no dress code, people just came in whatever they wanted. And my mom told me something that just stuck to me. And she says, Look, um, our family are here because of every single one of us, all these people here. And actually, if we could, we'd have had 5,000 people come. We are where we are today because of every single one of these people. We are a product, we are a reflection of every single person we meet in life, and that's what I do now. I am who I am because of every single person I meet in life, either positively or negatively. So for me, I look at every person I meet as a mentor, either directly or indirectly, because the conversation we're having now is going to reflect onto me sometime in the future. So to me, that's probably one of the most important things anyone has told me, coming from my mom. But that set me on a trajectory of how you relate to people, how you connect with people, and seeing everyone as a teacher, seeing everyone as a mentor. Some everyone's got something to teach you in life. And I am where I am today because of all the different people I've met across my life, and everyone has taught me something. Those who treated me badly made me stronger. Those who treated me well, you know, helped me be successful. Either way, I've learned something. So that's what stuck with me.

SPEAKER_00 42:52

I love how your mom explained her reasons for um inviting 1200 people. She sounds very smart.

SPEAKER_01 42:59

Well, to be honest, I think, like I said, I'm I I was very fortunate. I I I came, you know, we had our problems. You know, my dad was the military, and you know, uh, and I'll be open, you know, one of the reasons I don't drink a lot of alcohol is I've seen the effects of alcohol in the military, and I don't want to go too much into that, but I I can't say that we were the perfect family, but we but I had parents at home. I had a father who did his responsibilities as a father, and I had a mother who did a responsibility. And I know a lot of people don't have that, and I'm really, really aware of that privilege. But what I do tell people is actually some of the things that made me really, really successful, I or deem successful, is actually lessons that you learn from your grandparents and your parents. You know, surround yourself with good people, work hard, just be honest and confident about yourself. And humility is key. And you don't need to go to university for that. You don't need to go for an expensive course. Just remember what you know the people around you have taught you. And if you're as fortunate as me and most people. Are I would say the simple lessons from your home life is probably all you need to succeed in this tough world. Show up on time, do the job, be polite, say please and thank you.

SPEAKER_00 44:15

If you could sit down for a coffee with your teenage self, what's the one lesson you'd share about bouncing back from setbacks and navigating life's ups and downs?

SPEAKER_01 44:25

If I was to sit with my teenage self, um, I'd actually go back down to failure. And I would just say, look, failure is actually your best friend. Failure means that you had the courage to try something and it just didn't work out. Because if you didn't have that courage, then you wouldn't have failed. So you look at failure as the ability or that courage that's within you. And I would say just keep on failing as many times as you can, and you will eventually reach success. That's why a lot of people, I think Jensen Huang, even he said, you know, I wish you all the failures in life. And I would paraphrase him, I'd wish myself all the failures in life, and say, you know, it's it's how you look at failure. I'd also advise him not to date a particular girl that I met a long time ago. I'd say stay away from her, she's not good news. Um, and probably put my arms around him and say, you know, life will be good, you know, just just stay the course. And I think uh to me, you know, it's uh that's the advice I would give. I think uh it got me really thinking, uh Aiden. But yeah, I would just tell myself, you know, don't worry about it. Failure is gonna be your best friend for them for the rest of your life.

SPEAKER_00 45:47

If you weren't a clinician or health tech leader, what other career role might you have pursued?

SPEAKER_01 45:54

Either a pilot or a chef. Oh, really? Yeah. Uh pilot because I absolutely love traveling. I love getting on planes.

SPEAKER_00 46:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:04

And my mom, interesting, you're gonna find a way to travel for your work. And that's why people see me, I'm always around the world traveling, is because that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to travel, and I found a way to allow my work to allow me to travel, to make my work allow me to travel. Uh, chef, purely because I, you know, I come from Malaysia. We love our food. Uh, food brings people together. And uh I love creating, it's the it's my zen state of cooking different kinds of food, and that's what I've been doing. You know, you might have seen some of my LinkedIn posts about teaching my girls how to cook. Um, so that's the time you know, every Sunday. Um because of my love for cooking, I couldn't be a chef. I don't think I even had the uh the aptitude to have to handle the stress of a chef. Uh, but I teach my little girl how to make chicken soup every Sunday. That's what we do uh whenever I'm home. And white chicken soup, it's really simple. Some simple ingredients that she can chop up herself without a sharp knife, of course. Uh, and she can also freeze it. Uh, she's learned to handle meat and she learns about hygiene, very basic ingredients, but it sets a foundation for building up her cooking skills. But what's most important are two things. Number one is she knows that I make the time to do something really, really boring and really monotonous every Sunday. Yeah, but that's where her comfort's gonna be. Well, you know, it's not gonna be a big pizza or a steak, you know. When she's not feeling well, make soup. Yeah, you don't have much money, make soup. Yeah, you have people coming over and you got no time, make soup. Um, so yes, I couldn't be a pilot, but now I'm able to travel as much as I can, uh, thanks to the work I do. I couldn't be a chef, but I still love cooking. And I try to use uh cooking as a way to uh bring me closer to my children. And of course, I love having people around the table. So whenever there's an opportunity to cook for a whole load of people, uh, I'm the first person to raise their hands and say, I'll do the cooking. Nice.

SPEAKER_00 48:15

When you look back in your career in 10 years' time, what legacy do you hope to have left for the next wave of health tech leaders?

SPEAKER_01 48:24

I I think it's we there's there's a there's a Chinese saying, rising tide raises all boats. And I think we need to celebrate everyone else's achievements. And I don't think we do that enough. I don't think we share enough. I'm fortunate that now I've surrounded myself with some fantastic health tech leaders, uh, just to name a few people like Rizvan Malek, Natasha Devendrelingham. Um, and the list goes on. And we're all now of the mindset we need to support each other. We don't have to pull each other down. There's no one-upmanship in this field. This field's big enough. And actually, if interestingly, by lifting someone else up, you lift yourself up. Yeah. So I think that's where we're again is this whole multi-generational thinking. We need to support each other for the next generation. It's not about us, it's about our children. And so I think the legacy I like to leave people is you know, we we need to celebrate each other, we need to work together and respect each other. And uh competition is great as long as it's healthy, but there's no need to be vicious when it comes to competition. But you know, uh, and I would support all my colleagues the same way they support me.

SPEAKER_00 49:49

Something that um has consistently come out in these podcasts is about people and humanity, and uh um, and I love that because that's what it's about, right?