Jut try getting into Medicine as a mature-aged student. And once (if) you get in, you'd better have strong family supports to get through the course, and a free place to stay.

Medical university places are highly rationed and highly sought after. The UMAT test is basically an IQ test with unvalidated components such as 'shape-matching' - ACER confirmed to me that they have done no validity testing on this at all. (I got 91st percentile - top 9% - on the IQ/logic part and about 30th percentile on the shapes. Anyhow, undergraduate mature-age places are deliberately rationed or disallowed at all Australian universities, even if you do well overall.)

I will now spend a year swotting for the GAMSAT, although you need a minimum credit average in your first degree, and, once again, it all gets a bit ridiculous.

I was accepted into a Masters in Nursing Practice, but dropped it for a variety of reasons, some to do with the obvious 'politics' of Nursing vs Medicine - there are too many lines of demarcation, strongly lobbied for and jealously guarded by the AMA, and only some kite-flying suggestions for breaking down some of the barriers. Who knows, though, it may happen. One day.

Further, I know that I can make far more money in my first career of IT than doing Nursing.

Prof Dwyer, I read your book 'The Body at War' some years ago, and loved it, and it gave me some impetus towards trying to work in healthcare in a rewarding and challenging role. My other loves are sociology and philosophy, somewhat away from the pragmatics of health science...