CAREERS
Exploring professional identity: the mirror that appears too late
Nicky Rouse explores how the training of biomedical scientists and the role itself can present barriers to the formation of a clear professional identity; one that is not faced by other healthcare professions.
Do you remember your first day in a real clinical laboratory, not the teaching laboratory, but the bench where the results matered? Did you feel ready to take your place in the profession? If you were anything like me, probably not. Biomedical scientists generate much of the data behind clinical decisions yet form their professional identity around work the public rarely sees, mediated by instruments rather than patients, and learned through a route that separates theory from practice almost by design. A closer look at the theory behind
how identity develops more generally suggests that we may underestimate the impact of asking students to go from competent and confident academic performers to healthcare professionals. They may find themselves struggling to grasp the basics of the new environment they find themselves in. Researchers in the wider field of professional identity formation in healthcare have coined the term ‘transition shock’ to describe this situation.1
Does this apply to biomedical science? Does it mater?
The stakes On the surface, this transition shock might look like a pastoral issue, but it is actually a workforce recruitment and retention issue. An IBMS-accredited degree is intended to equip graduates with a broad and versatile skillset. The IBMS has set out in its strategy for 2026-2029 the aim to ‘focus on building skills that well-rounded healthcare professionals need to progress’.2
However, the same skills that produce
a well-rounded healthcare professional are highly desirable across the entirety of the biosciences and healthcare industry. They are skills that are highly sought in professions such as research and development, the pharmaceutical industry, data science, biotechnology and science journalism. The breadth of professional skills that the role needs is what gives these graduates more doors than more targeted pre-registration
programmes, such as occupational therapy or physiotherapy. So, the more well-rounded we make them, the harder they are to keep. As it stands, some 3,400 graduates
eligible to become biomedical scientists each year choose not to.2
who have more options in terms of the range of professions they might enter, we need them to want to choose and to commit to something that represents arguably the harder path than other
For graduates
Biomedical scientists generate much of the data behind clinical decisions, yet are seldom seen by the public as the professionals they are, and often encounter the profession modelled comparatively late in their training.
October 2026
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