Dr Rachel Baumber is Consultant, Anaesthetics and Critical Care Lead for Critical Care at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital NHS Trust. Rachel has authored the narrative article, Management of the patient with potential for massive perioperative blood loss, and the editorial, The unseen haemorrhage: why occult blood loss remains the blind spot of perioperative care, in Advances in Perioperative Care, volume 1. Here Rachel writes about her career, research areas and interests outside of work.

What drew you to medicine?

I always liked learning about the human body and how it worked, physiology interested me far more than anatomy and medicine seemed like a natural step to further this knowledge. I also like the challenge of investigating something and coming up with a way of managing or dealing with a problem, which fits in very well with anaesthesia and critical care.

What is your area of expertise?

I am an orthopaedic anaesthetist and lead for critical care at the RNOH. I specialise in complex joint reconstruction, primary bone cancer (sarcoma) and metastatic cancer. Some of these are simple, but many require complex perioperative management with significant perioperative risk and major haemorrhage.

You’ve written two papers in APOC on blood loss, how did you come to focus on this area of research?

Unfortunately this expertise comes from experience of having to manage major haemorrhage in theatres on a regular basis. Major pelvic sarcoma operations such as hindquarter amputations or sacrectomies can easily lose over 5 litres of blood and so having anaesthetised for these cases for over 10 years means I have managed this on a regular basis.

What are your interests outside of work?

My 6 year old keeps me fairly busy outside of work, but I still love to cook and bake on a regular basis. Good food, shared with friends and family is a joy for me, and baking is my way of relaxing. My colleagues benefit greatly from this (as do their waistlines!).

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