From the time she was 3 years old, Tafadzwa Mandiwanza, who grew up in Harare, Zimbabwe, told her father that she would become a doctor.

“My mum is a nurse and my dad remembers me telling him when I was 3 years old that I was going to be a doctor,” Mandiwanza, speaking of her experience of becoming a brain surgeon, said, The Irish Times reports. “My parents fostered that ambition.”

Originally, Mandiwanza had her sights set on becoming a cardiothoracic surgeon but changed her mind after surgical training at Cork University Hospital, where she performed a subdural hematoma, a procedure that alleviates pressure from the brain by draining the blood.

“I was 25 and I had to drill holes into the skull to open the lining (dura) of the brain to let out fluid, which lessens the pressure. The procedure took less than one hour, but I was amazed that I could do it even if the registrar was scrubbed up next to me the whole time,” she said.

Now, Mandiwanza is the first Black pediatric neurosurgeon at Temple Street Children’s University Hospital in Ireland, Face2Face Africa reports.

She said that her chosen career is demanding because the neurosurgical issues found in the pediatric age group are sometimes tricky and intricate. The nervous system of children requires more time and reexamination throughout their childhood and adolescence, according to Face2Face Africa.

“We see children with devastating injuries and horrible traumas, but children are very resilient and they have a much greater capacity to recover and bounce back than adults do. It’s hard as a parent to be responsible for someone else’s child, yet I feel I can be more empathic because I am a parent too. I give parents the time to process what is happening and talk through the operation and its risks and complications,” Mandiwanza told Face2Face Africa.

Mandiwanza revealed that she hasn’t experienced too many incidents of discrimination as a female surgeon, despite how rare it is for women to be represented in the field.

Mandiwanza and Catherine Moran, who works as an adult neurosurgeon at Beaumont Hospital in Ireland, are the only two female neurosurgeons in Ireland.

She credits her mentors for helping her along her journey in her medical career, but revealed that she struggles with imposter syndrome from time to time.

“I don’t think I’d be in this position if I hadn’t had the mentors that I had — people who had my back and offered me advice and encouragement. I’d like to be available now to mentor other neurosurgeons — particularly women coming through those long training pathways. [As women surgeons] we’re definitely more empathetic and a bit less God-like [in comparison to male surgeons]. All surgeons have a certain amount of ego, and you have to, but female surgeons are more self-effacing. I’ve read that imposter syndrome is no longer a thing, but I have to remind myself on a daily basis that I am a neurosurgeon,” Mandiwanza said, Because of Them We Can reports.

Tafadzwa-Mandiwanza

Get relevant content delivered to you once a week