Aseem Rahman

Hi, I'm Aseem. I'm currently in Leicester and I'm a doctor with a professional sports team.

That's a very tricky question as it varies day to day. But I think in a sentence you'd say helping the players.

Obviously they have a lot of injuries, so helping them out with that. They're still people, so helping them out with any illnesses or anything like that that they might have.

And maybe one of the bits that people don't see is helping them as people as well. So as a doctor in a football club, you're one of the few people that is there for them, not just as a footballer, but as a person trying to help them develop, trying to look after them, trying to look out for their best interests.

Yeah, so I think helping people would be my short answer.

So a typical day would be into the training ground, which is a lovely facility we have here, for about eight o'clock.

Then we have a meeting where we will discuss all the players, discuss who's injured, who's ill, who might be coming back from injury, all those sorts of bits with myself and the team. Then after that, the players that need an assessment, whether it be an injury, again, an illness, we'll see them and make a decision around training and what they can do with the day or a match or however it might pan out.

After that, it would be the training session itself. So most days the footballers will train in the morning.

And in the summertime, I'm the one lucky enough to go out and see them and kick a few footballs around and just check that they're all okay, deal with their injuries. In the wintertime, I'm the one unlucky enough to have to go out in the rain and just stand on the side of a pitch, again, doing the same thing.

So it's quite weather dependent as to the enjoyment levels, but generally it's really good fun being around the team, being around the players, getting to know them, learning a little bit more about football as well.

So after we had the training session, we'll come in, if there's any knocks or anything like that, might see them.

And then in the afternoon, after the training session is over, it's more admin meetings. There's a lot of things we have to do to sort of fulfil the criteria of being a sort of top level academy within the football game. So we have to sort those things out. Might be seeing some more players as well.

Obviously, all of that goes to one side if it's a match day, everything gets shifted a little bit further into the evening. So then it's all around the match.

And then you might see them before the match, obviously cover the match, so be on the sidelines like you've seen in the dugouts. Run on if there's any injuries. And then deal with them after the game.

There's also other bits that we do, so going down to appointments with players, helping them, you know. Maybe meeting parents, meeting teachers, all those sorts of things around those days as well.

So every day is a little bit different.

Yeah, so I was really surprised when I started working in football about the number of people that we have in the club.

Essentially, our goal is to make better footballers and make better people, but there's a whole range of people.

So there's physios, who I work very closely with, who are the experts in injuries and rehabbing players. Then the sports scientists, who again, look at how much people are running, whether they should be running more and do lots of clever things with data.

And the psychologists helping the players get the best out of themselves. There's nutritionists making sure that they eat the right sorts of things. And if they have any advice or any sort of guidance they need around that.

There's player care. So a branch of the club where they look after the players generally in their lives.

And then there's all sorts of other people, obviously. So the coaches, the managers, the kitchen staff, there's a whole range of people that go into making footballers who they are and giving them the best chance to succeed.

It's a real, we call it a multidisciplinary team. So there's lots of expertise, which means that you often have to go into it without any, without much of an ego. So you can never really say that you're better than anyone else at deciding this. It's always a collaborative decision.

That takes sometimes a bit of getting used to but I think I'm generally quite good at that.

The best thing about my job is seeing the players and people develop.

So I work predominantly with youngsters, probably the similar age to yourself, so 11 till 21.

And some of those players I've known since they were very small and they've gone on now to do great things in the game. And equally, some of them have found their journey, you know, football wasn't for them, but they've gone on to do great things in their life as well.

So it's not all about making footballers, I think it's about making better people, giving them the skills that they can use. So very, I guess, very similar to teachers in some way. I've often said if I wasn't a doctor, I think I'd probably be a teacher for that reason.

I think it gives me a great deal of satisfaction to see people grow. And I know they don't always say thank you for it in the moment, but I hope that when they get to their end of their journeys with the club, they look back and think, you know, that doctor was a tiny cog in what's helped me through this.

I often have to be the one who breaks bad news to players. So if they have a particularly bad injury, one of the ones we have is something called an ACL. So a ligament in your knee that gets damaged. And if you have that, that's torn, you're really out for about a year.

So for a young person, that seems like a lifetime and it can be really devastating news. So it's quite hard to deliver that news.

And then moving on from that, there have been a few players that we've had to say, actually, if you carry on playing, you're going to risk your long-term health. So, you know, they've had to retire even at the young age. So again, that's a really difficult, tricky conversation to have.

But I think getting to know the players beforehand and having that relationship beforehand makes it a little bit easier. They have trust in you.

I don't think there's a typical journey for a football doctor, but I'll tell you mine.

I obviously went to university, studied medicine for five years, did my foundation training. So a couple of years of rotating around different specialities. Then I went into GP training for another three years. And then I got a job as a GP.

So I was GP in Leicester for around about 12 years. And I really enjoyed that, getting to know people. Being part of the community, I found that really, really fulfilling.

However, there was a point where I thought, is this it? I don't know if I can do this for another 30 years. So then I looked at things that I was enjoying in GP because you see all sorts of things.

And I realised the thing that I enjoyed was injuries, sports, and what we call MSK medicine, so musculoskeletal medicine. So I did a diploma in sports and exercise medicine at the University of Bath.

And with that, I volunteered at a basketball team just to get a bit of experience. And then a job came up in rugby. I think I pretty much fell into that job. I'm not sure they had many other people. I don't think I was particularly well qualified for it, but they appointed me and I sort of learnt on the job a little bit there, which was quite daunting, but I managed to get through it.

And then with that, got some experience and then the job at my current club came up. Initially it was for two days a week. So I was still a GP and this, but the club wanted me more and more. So I left GP around four years ago, and then just went into this.

So it's quite, it's not a straight route, I guess. And everyone I speak to in sports medicine has a sort of different route to get into it. Sometimes it is about luck and just being in the right place at the right time. I think that's probably my story.

I think there's loads of moments I'll never forget.

I think the first time I was covering a rugby game, I remember my heart rate watch. I'd never been pitchside, you know, the sounds and just the impact. I was thinking, my gosh, every ruck, someone could get injured. And I was thinking it's on me if that does happen. I think my heart rate was up at like 150 plus for the whole 80 minutes. So I'll never forget that.

I think generally from a medicine point of view, in one of my first jobs, there was a patient who was quite young, probably quite a similar age to myself at that time, 25-ish. And she became very unwell and unfortunately she passed away quite suddenly.

Experiences like that just show you, I think, generally how fragile life is and how much you need to try and cherish family, try and cherish connection, and try and make the most of what you've got.

So I was really shy in school. I would never raise my hand unless I was picked on to raise my hand because there was always this fear, there was this little voice in the back of my head saying, what if you get it wrong? What if people think you're, you know, you're not clever or you know, you're not, shouldn't be here or whatever it might be.

I wish I'd ignored that voice more. I wish I'd taken more opportunity to do those things that interested me, that I'd maybe been a bit cheekier, if I'm honest. I wouldn't have said boo to a goose when I was in school.

I found in my adult life, you know, you meet new people, you get opportunities, get invitations, all those sorts of things. So I think it would have been to take more opportunity to not be so scared of what people think a little bit and more just do what you want to do.