We're not able to do anything about the bomb, but we can do something about the results. We're able to heal the people - not all of them. Some people died. But we're able to heal people, so we're doing something positive. And that's a great motivator.

You don't do anybody any favours by being less than you are.

People can lose so much skin that it has a huge effect on the body and when they scar they are affected for life. I've worked in this area and have for years tried to improve spray on skin cells, but this is just one part of the jigsaw towards making it better. We needed to get it on quicker then we can reduce the scarring. That's my motivation, my drive towards making it better.

I think plans failing is a really interesting question. I've been on a long journey. I'm 54 now and that's seriously old. I hope I still have heaps of years to go. Every day there's new success and some failures. But believe you me you can always get better - but things don't always go how you'd expect all the time. What you have to do is pick yourself up and keep going. That's part of life.

Being able to influence the outcome, being able to do something about it, to be able to stop the bleeding. You're not being useful if you're just standing there going "Oh, that's awful!" You're only useful if you actually do something about it and I think that goes for everything. If you actually do something about what's in front of you, then you are actually contributing and you haven't got time to be self-centred or sorry for yourself. You should be doing something about the person you really should feel sorry for.

My mother's great line was, Grasp the nettle with two hands, girl, because if you don't somebody else will.

I can do something about people who need me, who have been injured. So the biggest thing about being a doctor is my education and training means I can help people to reduce their suffering and that's what being a doctor is, to reduce suffering and to try to improve the life of people who have been injured.