Never Have I Ever with Claire Byrne
Jul 15, 2026 · 48 min · 11 segments
Consultant paediatric surgeon Jennifer Billington takes Claire Byrne behind the operating theatre doors, sharing what it's really like to operate on babies and children, where every millimetre matters…
Jennifer BillingtonGuest
Claire ByrneHost
... your me- social media bio describes you as surgeon, baker, Irish dance teacher.
So what that involves is I operate on any baby from the point of viability.
So that's a kind of contentious addition itself, but it's around 22 or 23 weeks of gestational age, so about the size maybe 400 or 500 grams, all the way through to 16, 17-year-olds.
So that can be emergency operations on their bowel, it can be babies that are born with problems so that their, for example, their organs may not be formed in the correct way, kind of elective general things like lumps and bumps and hernias.
Um, and then I also work in a major trauma center, so we look after people that have major road traffic accidents, falling off horses, knife crime.
So when you meet people first and you say that that is what you do, what is the reaction that you get?
I still unfortunately think that despite the prevalence of men and women in medical school, there's more females in medical school now than men, there's still a s- tiny proportion of consultant female surgeons.
I think people are generally surprised, and I'm usually mistaken for someone who's not the surgeon.
So I could be mistaken for the physiotherapist, or the nurse, or the dietician.
And even if I say I'm a surgeon, people will often forget that, and then they'll say, "Well, who are you again?" And they'll be quite surprised.
And why do you think that is, that there are so few consultant surgeons at your level when there's equal billing in medical school?
... your me- social media bio describes you as surgeon, baker, Irish dance teacher.
So what that involves is I operate on any baby from the point of viability.
So that's a kind of contentious addition itself, but it's around 22 or 23 weeks of gestational age, so about the size maybe 400 or 500 grams, all the way through to 16, 17-year-olds.
So that can be emergency operations on their bowel, it can be babies that are born with problems so that their, for example, their organs may not be formed in the correct way, kind of elective general things like lumps and bumps and hernias.
Um, and then I also work in a major trauma center, so we look after people that have major road traffic accidents, falling off horses, knife crime.
So when you meet people first and you say that that is what you do, what is the reaction that you get?
I still unfortunately think that despite the prevalence of men and women in medical school, there's more females in medical school now than men, there's still a s- tiny proportion of consultant female surgeons.
I think people are generally surprised, and I'm usually mistaken for someone who's not the surgeon.
So I could be mistaken for the physiotherapist, or the nurse, or the dietician.
And even if I say I'm a surgeon, people will often forget that, and then they'll say, "Well, who are you again?" And they'll be quite surprised.
And why do you think that is, that there are so few consultant surgeons at your level when there's equal billing in medical school?
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