speaker-0: Welcome to the Impairment Perspectives Podcast, where science, law, and real-world experience intersect. Our purpose is simple: to cut through the noise and bring clarity to a complex world of drug and alcohol impairment. I'm your host, Joey Jones, a forensic toxicologist, crime lab director, and educator. Today, I am honored to get to welcome a globally recognized expert, a close friend, and an even better colleague. Dr. Karen Scott. Dr. Scott's journey is truly international from earning her PhD at the University of Glasgow to a postdoctoral research that she did in Tokyo. We first met in 2016 during her tenure at Arcadia University, where she turned forensic education into what I got to see was a truly immersive experience. Today she serves as the director of forensic toxicology at the University of Alabama, Birmingham. She's a leader in the Society of Forensic Toxicologists and the National Safety Council's Alcohol and Drug Impairment Division. She's a recent recipient of the 2025 Outso Outstanding Service to the ⁓ the Council of Forensic Science Educators. And she's truly someone that is completely remarkable in our field of forensic toxicology. I think you're gonna enjoy the conversation today that I get to have. And Dr. Scott, welcome. To the Impairment Perspectives podcast. Woo. Ooh. Yeah, this is a big deal. I mean, this is huge. People people forget how big of a deal it is to get to be on this. Hey, thank you so much for taking the time today. ⁓ I know that, ⁓ especially on behalf of drugimpairment dot com and some of the work that you've done with them, ⁓ to get the opportunity to sit down. I know your time's valuable. ⁓ But every time we're together, you're such a wealth of ⁓ of information and so I'm anxious to hear what you have to say today.
speaker-1: Yeah, well thanks for having me here, Joey. It's always great to have sit down and have a discussion with you, even though we're we're not in the same state. ⁓ sitting here on the camera with you. So and thanks for that ⁓ blushingly nice introduction. ⁓ Yeah.
speaker-0: Well, I always tell you you genuinely are. You're one of my favorite people. ⁓ just being around you often makes me feel smarter and that's that's encouraging. ⁓ but ⁓ I think even though I've known you ⁓ about a decade now, getting to sit down and actually kind of work through the how your C V there are things I didn't know about that I think even enhanced how remarkable I think of you ⁓ really starting with just, you know, your Scottish roots. Can you tell me what it's like? You got a bachelor's degree from ⁓ the University of Strathclyde, I said this correctly, right? Good. And ⁓ you can clearly tell I'm a Southern American here. we'll struggle through it. But then you earn your PhD from the University of Glasgow. What was it like kind of coming up through those programs here? ⁓ and and we're gonna try to build the journey to to you being over here in the States, but what was it like being in
speaker-1: Yes.
speaker-0: Early forensic science educator, seeing the explosion of things like CSI being an educator. Can you just kind of walk me through that?
speaker-1: Yes, so I mean forensic science, it's like like you said, forensic science ⁓ was in its infancy. ⁓ I I did my degree in the the late eighties. So ⁓ and I I feel that we were very much guinea pigs back then. The the program that I did, ⁓ I it was the second year of that program. It was a forensic and analytical chemistry degree. And and they they admitted to us that ⁓ to some degree they they didn't know what they were doing. The undergraduate degrees are very different over there. We we we don't have that ⁓ generalized education at the undergraduate level. So we we just did the the science and we had a couple of electives ⁓ within the degree, but from like nine till five, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, we were in ⁓ science classes, ⁓ mainly chemistry. We did some math and physics in there too. And I can't believe I just said math instead of maths, 'cause we call it maths in the UK. ⁓
speaker-0: You're becoming one of us.
speaker-1: Becoming American, right? ⁓ even though you wouldn't know it from my accent and our our master's programmes in the UK are also only one year and not two. so then when I moved into my my PhD program, I also didn't then need the the bridging science classes within the PhD program. So PhD programs in the UK are also a little bit different in that you don't have the the science classes to support the education piece of the PhD, it's just the the research that you do. So it's a three year program. You do three years worth of ⁓ bench research and the the classes that you take or the courses that you take to underpin the PhD are just the kind of ⁓ research based classes. ⁓ we did a first aid class as well, but it was really just you know how to write a thesis, ⁓ how to do literature searching, those types of classes that you take within the the PhD. So it's so yeah, very, very different from the education system over here, I would say. The the other thing that happened when when I was a student was that we were only really grading on the final exam. So there was a lot of pressure on that final thing at the end of the semester. There was no ⁓ you know, you got, you know, twenty percent of your grade for writing an essay or twenty percent of your grade for ⁓ a midterm. Everything was really based on that final exam. And I think a lot of the the courses from teaching in the UK, ⁓ it's a lot more ⁓ spread out now. Then they have changed how the education system works over there now compared with what it was when I was a student ⁓ in the eighties and early nineties.
speaker-0: Yeah. Well that's that's interesting. You know, I I I'd like desperately needed to kind of build up a pool of points before the final exam because of the damage that I would cause to my grade during that time. I ⁓ I would have been an anxious mess doing that.
speaker-1: Yeah, and and I think a lot of students who are very practical based are very good ⁓ with the the lab based ⁓ piece of it. ⁓ which you know when you're when you're in a job, right, if you're a bench scientist and you're actually very practical, we got no credit for that at all. We had to obviously pass the labs, you know, you wrote up your lab at the end of the you know, the end of the day and then handed in your lab book and you got it graded. ⁓ but that didn't count at all. ⁓ you just had to turn up and, you know, if you had ten labs ⁓ in that section of the semester you had to hand them all in, but they didn't count for anything. So you could be the best lab s lab based student and really do badly in exams and essentially fail your degree. ⁓ so it was it was a really weird, particularly for something like chemistry, which is so practical. And the only thing that was getting you to pass was not understanding the theory. So it was it was very weird back at that that time, or at least in the degree that I did.
speaker-0: ⁓ I bet I I'm curious. Like, did you know kind of from the jump that that forensic toxicology was what you wanted to do? ⁓ it
speaker-1: I think when No ⁓ So I knew that I liked the analytical piece of it. I liked the the instrumentation side. And when we got when we finally got to the the forensic part, 'cause we didn't really start doing the forensic piece. So the the way that the degree was structured, it was in the Department of Pure and Applied Chemistry. So the first three years were really just following the structure of the the pure chemistry degree. And then when we got into the the final year, we really started doing here's your forensic piece of this ⁓ undergraduate program. ⁓ so you know, we we learned about DNA and we learned about ⁓ drug chemistry, we learned about fibers, we did some microscopy, which I really didn't like. I got a headache every time I looked down a microscope. And then we did toxicology and I was like, ⁓ I like this part. ⁓ because I, you know, I liked like I said, I liked analytical chemistry. So I think that was where I I felt most at home within forensic science. ⁓ and then I I got the opportunity to do my PhD in forensic toxicology. So I think that's that's definitely where I felt most at home. I I knew I didn't want to be a DNA person. And I think even back then, ⁓ that was the area of forensic science where most people got most excited, right? That was the bit that solved crimes. DNA fingerprints, that type of thing was what mo it is what most people think of as forensic science. So ⁓ but I I think I always liked the the drugs and the toxicology section more. I I didn't wanna look at people's states.
speaker-0: Yeah, absolutely. I I I'm curious to get your opinion. I I've often told people, and maybe it's just the way that I'm wired. My dad traveled ⁓ all over the world growing up and I feel like that was just kind of hardwired into me that ⁓ I went pretty far away to undergraduate compared to where I lived. And ⁓ I I would assume if Scotland or Tokyo would have offered me a job, I probably would end up there. I just never felt like a physical ⁓ restraint and and I looked through you know, looking at your journey, you know, you leave Scotland, you go to Tokyo, Japan. That's something that is incredibly uncommon. Are you built hardwired to travel or is that just a logical next step in your career?
speaker-1: So it it's weird that you say that because I originally I I I wanted to do medicine but when I was when I was eighteen, nineteen, I actually didn't want to leave home. I I was very kind of rooted ⁓ w at my parents' house. I I did get accepted to medical school but it would have it would have meant leaving home because the the medical school at Glasgow University I it was very, very competitive and I didn't get in there. So to go to medical school would have meant leaving home and I I wasn't ready. I I was kind of shy, retiring and and just scared of the prospect of leaving my parents' house. ⁓ but by the time I I finished my undergraduate degree, you know, I I moved out of my parents' home. I was still I still stayed local. I went to Glasgow University because that's where the the PhD opportunity was. But I I did move out and I moved into an apartment in in Glasgow. And then by the time I finished that the postdoc opportunity came up and I I was definitely at that point ⁓ ready to spread my wings and and travel. But during my my time as an undergraduate student, I did travel. I I moved away in the summers and got summer jobs to to start earning some money and things like that. So by then I was happy to, you know, to to leave home more. But ⁓ and you know, I did have some regrets at being that kind of scared eighteen, nineteen year old and not maybe going to medical school and ⁓ you know, wonder, you know, you have that kind of like two paths and if you take this one rather than this one, I'm thinking now even like what what would I be doing now had I actually just taken that step and and gone to because I I got into two different medical schools. One was down in England. ⁓ and I could have still stayed with family. I had family near the one the one school in England. ⁓ You know, just wondering, you know, would w because I wanted to be a forensic pathologist, strangely. ⁓ you know, where where would I be now? What would I be doing had I just taken that alternative pathway?
speaker-0: Yeah. Tell tell me about Tokyo being there. Were you were you with people that you knew, or is this just y you on a whim by yourself figure life out?
speaker-1: Yeah, so ⁓ I had I had two two paths at that so everywhere I'd gone from from that point onwards there was always two options. So I got offered a job at a lab in Wales ⁓ to to set up ⁓ a testing lab there and then I got offered the postdoc in in Tokyo. ⁓ and my you know my my dad was like, Take the job in Wales, you know, you you can't go all the way to Tokyo So I you know you know after some hard thinking I I made the decision to to stay on the more kind of I guess academic path and I yeah, so I you know, I I I I went to Tokyo and that was probably the scariest thing I've I've ever done. I like, you know, yeah, I didn't know anybody there. I had met I met the the head of the lab, so the PI of the lab at a conference, but that that was it. I didn't know anybody else there. So He picked me up at the airport. He dropped me off at they had the Olympic park. that because they'd had the the Winter Olympics, I guess, there, the the year before, a couple of years before, and that was still situated. So he dropped me off the, you know, picked me up at the airport. We went for something to eat, and he just dropped me off. So there I was, you know, on my own in Tokyo. I had I didn't speak Japanese. I'd been in Japan once for a conference. ⁓ so at least I knew roughly what the layout was. ⁓ you know, I was so I was sitting in my room and I was starving. ⁓ I knew roughly how to get to the nearest ⁓ subway system. So I got off at a random subway stop and got up and then I saw the big yellow ⁓ of McDonald's. I had my first kneel online Tokyo was McDonald's. I didn't know what else to do. So I had I had McDonald's.
speaker-0: It it's like an anchor for many of us. It's like, Okay, you're gonna dump, you're gonna be
speaker-1: But yeah, so I you know, I saw all these other restaurants and that, you know, everything's written in Japanese and I I had no clue what to do. So I yeah, I had McDonald's for my very first mail in Tokyo on my own. But and ⁓ you know, the next morning ⁓ he you know he picked me up and took me to my apartment and showed me how to get from my apartment to work the next day and ⁓ from there on it was it was yeah, it was it was interesting. But they 'cause I was there as part of a fellowship, they had you know, magazine that came out ⁓ once once a month and it had contact information for the other fellows who were there. So I I I reached out to other people because the the first month was very much I would get up in the morning, I would go to work, I would be there before my boss, I would stay there until my boss left and then I would go home. I I I didn't have ⁓ a social life. And then maybe once every couple of weeks the people in my lab would go out after the lab, but you know, it my social life died and I'm quite a social person. So but then we would still be home at the same time that we would be home if we were working because they had families and you know their own lives, you know. So eventually I just I got in contact with a group of people from the the magazine to say help. Help needed a Scottish girl in Tokyo ⁓ requires social life. I have a kind of help female. ⁓ and then I found a group of people ⁓ that lived in Tokyo because the the the fellowship was for the entirety of ⁓ Japan. So I found the ones that were living in the Tokyo area ⁓ and I found a friend group that way. And it it kind of took off from there. Originally I was supposed to be in Tokyo for one year and I ended up extending my fellowship and I stayed there for For two years.
speaker-0: Incredible. What a great.
speaker-1: I I had a fantastic time in in Japan. I I really, really enjoyed my time there.
speaker-0: But it's it's one of the themes that I think we've talked about with some of the other guests that ⁓ aren't equally talented, ⁓ where, you know, you can go someplace, you learn a lot about yourself, you learn how to how to grow in areas maybe that are not comfortable to you. And it's okay to know that that's not ⁓ where you're not supposed to be. You know, long term you can you take that with you and I think that helps refine what you really want in life. Can you so I I'm trying to build a bridge ultimately to to twenty sixteen when you and I met. There's there's a time gap. Can you kind of give us the brief view of of the transition after postdoc? Where were you and how did that lead to you coming over to the United States?
speaker-1: So so from from Tokyo. ⁓ so that that was that was interesting. So yeah, so I was there ⁓ like I said, I was there for two years. ⁓ and then when it was time to leave, you know, so I I trained as a forensic toxicologist, I you know, I had some publications and then, you know, ultimately I I wanted to I wanted to come back to the UK ⁓ and get a job as a forensic toxicologist. So they had at the time there was a book of all of the laboratories. ⁓ i I think it was a an international book of of forensic labs. ⁓ so I just started writing to all of the labs to say, hey, this is me, here's my here's my resume, C V and I I knew that I wanted to go somewhere where English was the the first language. I'm not I'm not an I don't have a natural gift for foreign languages. We as part of my as part of my postdoc, ⁓ I went to Japanese lessons, but I I never really picked up the language very well. And one of the reasons why this postdoc existed in Japan was that they wanted English speaking people to work with them to help them with publications in English. So there was never a big push for the people in my lab to speak Japanese with me, so I wasn't speaking Japanese on a daily basis particularly. ⁓ so I I knew I wanted to go somewhere that English was the the primary language. I also ⁓ unfortunately at the time knew that I didn't want to go to America because I'd had a bad summer experience in nineteen ninety one, ⁓ where I worked at a lab up in Pennsylvania. ⁓ the ⁓ that we don't need to go into that in any detail here. But I I didn't want to come to the States at that point. So ⁓ I was applying to jobs in Canada, I applied to jobs in Australia and obviously back in the UK. And every single place that I applied to told me that I was overqualified. So I I felt like at that point that I might have made a mistake ⁓ by first of all doing the PhD and then by doing the postdoc because I think the the feeling was that
speaker-0: Wow.
speaker-1: I I think a lot of people felt like I was gunning for their jobs. Because I wanted to I wanted to be a bench scientist, right? I wanted to actually go in and be a forensic toxicologist working at the bench. So and this is something that I've I've talked with my students about is just be careful not to overqualify yourself or go in with the expectations because I have students obviously who want to go into PhD programs, you know, they get their masters and then they want to go on and do a PhD is just to Be realistic about what your expectations are for getting a job at the end of that. Think about what your career is going to look like down the line if you go and do a PhD. You know, what what what is your expectation of your career path after that? Right. If if you want an if you want to be an academic, that's a good idea. If you want to be a bench scientist, think carefully ⁓ about what your expectations are in doing that. So
speaker-0: Yeah, that's wise advice. That comes up a lot, you know. I mean, especially being on the other side and hiring now. I I've seen those conversations trickle in where you go through a list of candidates. And I wonder, you know, I think at least over my career in in twenty in two thousand and eight we had the the financial crisis. Mm-hmm. And then of course COVID. And so you had these kind of dead years where either people were let go from jobs or they were trying to transition into something. And I think a lot of lot of our colleagues started advancing their education. ⁓ it was a perfect time to go get a a master's degree or something and yeah. ⁓ it might have not panned out the way that they wanted to, ⁓ because of what you were describing.
speaker-1: Yeah, ⁓ you know, so so it was tough. ⁓ but I I definitely don't regret it now. ⁓ but it did it did push me into the next step in in my career where I ended up being being an academic. But ⁓ and and you know, I've I've said I always have ended up with these two two things happening. So simultaneously it's ⁓ I I I ended up moving back to I moved back to Scotland, I ended up moving back into my p my parents and you know, kept on applying for jobs and thankfully ⁓ the situation only lasted for a couple of months. So I applied for a couple of jobs. They were both down in England and I interviewed for a consultancy company and ⁓ an academic position and got offered them both at the same time. ⁓ so I had another choice to make. So ⁓ say again.
speaker-0: No, I said always two, so there's your two choices.
speaker-1: Always came into it, right? So ⁓ so I had the opportunity to either ⁓ take on a position as a consultant, forensic toxicologist, or to take on a position in academia. So ⁓ that time I I chose academia. So again out of my comfort zone at the time I I didn't I'd always said I didn't want to be a teacher. Both of my parents ⁓ had teaching positions. I saw how stressed it made them. and and here I am with, you know, I don't know how many years of ⁓ teaching under my belt and more than I more than I like to to count. So ⁓ so that started my academic career back in ⁓ what, two thousand. ⁓ I started my career as an educator.
speaker-0: Incredible. Ten years ago I get the chance to ⁓ I actually drove. I was living in Columbus, Ohio at the time. And ⁓ we had a colleague, good friend of both of ours, Frank Carro. We love Frank. Yes. And Frank had ⁓ text me at the time and asked if I would be willing to come out to Arcadia. And ⁓ I I we spoke about something, I have no idea what it was. I can't recall it off the top of my head. But ⁓ there's where I met Dr. Karen Scott at an incredible event that we had. You got to teach, I got to teach. ⁓ it's pretty special getting in front of that crowd. ⁓ what do you remember about that day?
speaker-1: About that. That particular day I probably been running around like a headless chicken 'cause it was feeling a bit chaotic 'cause I was hosting it. I
speaker-0: Yeah. I am a very nice. So I'll you what I remember. Yeah, so so yeah, so we get ⁓ we get to this I mean the class was the class for you know, it was it was a nice typical university setting. And then at some point it transitions over to the most bizarre thing I've ever seen on a forensic science ⁓ campus. Where you go to this yeah, too far from like the university itself, you you had some form of like a rental house that
speaker-1: Afterwards I know. ⁓ we owned it, the university owned the house.
speaker-0: ⁓ is that what it was? So the university owned the house, but it was just like a neighborhood house.
speaker-1: Yes, ⁓ they owned all of the houses along that street.
speaker-0: And that house was completely converted into a forensic science art exhibit. Essentially. The the living room was a crime scene. Of which I have a picture of you, me, and I believe Sabre with a ⁓ dummy that had been shot in the head. And then at one point and I'll never forget this.
speaker-1: Yes.
speaker-0: Like upstairs in a closet there were aquariums of what I remember were like beetles chewing on things. It was ⁓ it was creepy. It was a ho house of horrors ⁓ at this school. Do you r did were you part of setting that entire thing up?
speaker-1: possibly. I mean, we we used the house for several different functions. I was pivotal in getting us that house. So when when I started, ⁓ when I took over as the director of the program, we th they they had a a a kind of basement room that they used as the the kind of crime scene space. And ⁓ that whole that whole space was been taken over as the alumni house and they were taking away our crime scene space. So I I, you know, so various conversations with the administration at the university I said, like, we can't have a forensic size program without a crime scene space. And we have a crime scene investigation class, we have a patterns class, but we use that space for and we also use it as part of our recruitment and process. We use it during open houses and and things like that. And we can also use it for ⁓ bringing in like high school groups and things like that. So I don't care where you give us as a space, but we have to have a space. And and so they gave us a house. So it was we went from like this one room underneath the staircase to having the entire house. So for for a little bit of time we shared it with an they had an architect on campus because they were doing some building projects and things. So for a while we we shared it with an architect. He had one of the the levels in the house. ⁓ and then I I think even so today we share it with the the paramedics 'cause there's they have a a requirement to have a a certain ⁓ time limit in terms of how quickly we can get an ambulance to anywhere on campus because they they do have resident students on campus. ⁓ so which which makes it look all the more authentic, right? Because there's an ambulance sitting out there all the time unless it's actually in use. ⁓ but yeah, so we we have that. There's a kitchen area, there's a dining room area, there's a living room area, and then there's two bedrooms and an attic space in there as well. So it it's a really nice facility. and then we you know we went to various charity shops and you know anybody that had stuff that they were getting rid of we just we just brought it in and tried to make it look pretty. One of the one of the latest I'll get to the bug area but one one of the one of the the girls in the English department, her husband works as a a movie producer, so he came and did some of the staging and things for us as well. So it it turned it turned out really good. But yes, the the bug area. ⁓ so we we have flesh eating beetles up there. Or we have flesh eating beetles, but they only eat dead flesh. So they they were never gonna hurt an individual who came in there, but we could use it to scare
speaker-0: Peter.
speaker-1: ⁓ some of the school groups. If we had kids that weren't behaving, we could help them, we were going to feed them to the flesh eating Brutex butt
speaker-0: Yeah. But i i it was it was quite eye opening. I remember I remember at the time thinking to myself, I'm like, this is the only place I've ever heard that recruits bugs into a house. Most of the time we're trying to
speaker-1: Yeah, we definitely didn't want any exterminators coming in there. That would not have been a good thing.
speaker-0: ⁓ yeah. ⁓ goodness. Well it it was really special ⁓ to be a part of that. I I never thought that that day would end up being ⁓ such a catalyst for personally my career. ⁓ as as I shared, you know, I mean and I think I mixed it up in the beginning. ⁓ you've been a greater friend than colleague ⁓ a co ⁓ over the course of my ⁓ career and ⁓ and and so it's been ⁓ it's been quite a joy. I never thought that, you know, here we are t over ten years later, ⁓ still getting to interface because ⁓ there was a flesh eating bug on a campus one in you know in Pennsylvania somewhere. it's unique because you know you built kind of your foundation and and for me you've always been that resource of someone who is directly plugged in with education of forensic science on a collegiate level in in the United States. ⁓ incoming students that ⁓ are are getting educated. And yet you go through another kind of transition in your career where ⁓ or now you're back in the laboratory in Birmingham, Alabama, of all places. I'm guessing when you were in Tokyo, Birmingham wasn't on the map of ⁓ what was next in my career. Tell me about this kind of new phase and and what life is like being in the laboratory
speaker-1: I know right. Yeah, so It is it's definitely different. I think I I didn't ⁓ it's not it's not like I I burned out. I think that this was just another this was another opportunity, right? And it happened because of one of the classes at Arcadia. ⁓ we had a seminar class and they had invited one of the medical examiners from that I that I worked with now, they'd invited them to come up and talk to the students. And while they were one of the medical examiners was speaking one of their colleagues was in the ⁓ the chat room. So this was during COVID. Mm-hmm. And then ⁓ she's private chatting me and she's You're a forensic toxicologist, aren't you? Yes. And she's like, Can we set up a s a separate time to have a chit chat afterwards? Yes, we can. ⁓ so they were their current ⁓ director was retiring and they needed a replacement. And I think she just got me at a a a time where I was feeling the need to get back into being a practitioner, I was missing this part of my career because when I worked to I so after I left my first academic appointment, I actually went back to Glasgow University where ⁓ I had done my PhD and and there I had a a kind of triple role. I set up a master's in forensic toxicology program, but I was also a practitioner at the same time. So it was a kind of split bowl. working as a forensic toxicologist with the medical examiners teaching. And then we also had ⁓ a research role ⁓ there as well. And when I came over to Arcadia, that was mainly a teaching role with some research. And I I wasn't really doing any practitioner work other than my consultancy. And because I'd been there, I think at the time around eight years, I felt that if I didn't get back into being a practitioner, I was going to essentially lose those practitioner skills to the point where I was never going to be able to go back to doing that. So I think she she got me at that perfect time of if I don't do it now, I'm never going to make that jump back. ⁓ so I said, Okay okay, you know, tell me more about this. She said, well why don't you come, you know, you know, come down, see us, come down in the summer because I don't know if you're gonna handle the heat with Alabama. ⁓ and it g it gets warm in in the northeast as as you know. but I think when they brought me down it was the coldest summer they'd ever had. So and I I was actually able to wander around with a cardigan on and I was like, I don't know what you're talking about. It's not that warm down here compared with what we get up in the Philly, New Jersey area. and yeah, so I came and I looked at the lab and I thought, Well, y you need some you need some resources here, but this is fine and everybody's friendly and the food's good and so and you know, a year and a half later I I made the move ⁓ to leave Arcadia and I helped them work through 'cause they were about to go through their re accreditation. So I helped them with that process, made sure that they were in a good situation and I made the move to come through. So that was my next kind of I could stay or I could leave and I I made the decision to leave and and come down to Alabama. So
speaker-0: W with you being in Alabama, I I'm not too far away, not terribly far away in the state of Louisiana. I absolutely I consider myself your neighbor. ⁓ summers are quite ⁓ brutal though. They they you smartened up to a hot ⁓ southern summer, right? No? Yeah.
speaker-1: Yeah, you're you're my neighbour now, right? Yeah, yeah, but I j I just don't go outside. I I I take vitamin D and I stay inside.
speaker-0: I I I tell people all the time that and I say this about Louisiana, but quite frankly, if I lived in Alabama, I'd say the same thing. The state bird is a mosquito. And ⁓ they are ⁓ they're giant You know, they might have something they claim. No, it's the mosquitoes. They're everywhere and ⁓ summers are brutal for sure.
speaker-1: Well so the mos the mosquitoes down here don't actually bother me. The the mosquitoes in ⁓ New Jersey they they like me. The the ones down here, I I think th I think they realize that my blood is polluted by the New Jersey mosquitoes and the ones down here they're reverse to that for some reason. I I'm not
speaker-0: feel like a new Jersey mosquito's got like an edge, you know, that ⁓ the world ⁓ the world of of mosquitoes, the Jersey mosquitoes.
speaker-1: That's an age. Definitely has the edge. But I haven't I haven't I haven't actually encountered the Alabama mosquitoes yet. They they seem to ⁓ don't like my blood, partly. They don't like Scottish blood.
speaker-0: Yeah. Well th I would imagine they love the football teams. So ⁓ goodness. Well you know, this I this kind of what I really wanted to focus on ⁓ with the time we have left. I know we only have about maybe ten minutes. of everyone that I know in the field of forensic toxicology, ⁓ to me you're one of the the very few that you you've kind of had the responsibility of educating the people that we try to hire and bring into the labs. Then you're on the front lines working in the lab and seeing ⁓ maybe ⁓ strengths and hurdles. And I'm not implying that your sta this is anything that's going on with your staff, but that you've seen kind of what what happens when individuals go and they're educated collegiately in forensic science. ⁓ it it seems like a a great opportunity. And I know this is a project that we've discussed working on. You're ⁓ heading up with a committee you and I are both on with ⁓ the Society of Forensic Toxicologists, the Toxicology Resource Committee, of really being someone who can truly identify areas that are missing in ⁓ in education and things that we need. Can you talk a little bit, ⁓ maybe for a few minutes about ⁓ about the education gap survey and and kind of the background on that and what kind of led to maybe some something we want to try to ⁓ put out this year.
speaker-1: Yeah, absolutely. So so this actually it came about from from two different angles. So the first one was on a a conversation that I got involved with on LinkedIn. ⁓ this was a a colleague had posted about the the way that the instruments are becoming more black box. So I r I remember you know, from when I was doing my PhD and it know, with the instruments they were kind of forward facing. And when I was training, being able to be very hands on and ⁓ like on my HPLC, doing a lot of the repairs and things myself. So I knew what a check valve looked like, I knew what a pump seal looked like. And if those parts of the instrument needed to be replaced or repaired, doing that myself. ⁓ whereas those instruments now are very much those parts are very hidden. just because they've become much more sophisticated. And if I had to you know, if you need a lot of those repairs done now, you have to call an engineer in because they're kinda lock and keyed in in the back facing part of the instrument. So you typically don't change those things out or maybe they don't need to be changed out so often now. ⁓ but those things are still in the instruments and maybe you learn theoretically what they do and what they're there for or ⁓ or maybe you don't. Maybe we don't typically teach those components when we're in in on the education side anymore. ⁓ so the comment on LinkedIn was ⁓ was very much about how a lot of these instruments that we're moving over to in the labs, like the LC MS MS or LCQ Top MS, are becoming black boxes because we're We're very much plug and play. Like our analysts know how to put the samples into the auto sampler and then press play, right? But when it comes down to troubleshooting, they really don't know how to do those parts. And there's a a kind of move to just call on the engineer to get them to fix, right? Rather than using your staff to do that. The the second thing that happened was an interaction with one of my research students here at UMEB, where ⁓ you know, I had asked them to ⁓ we had we had gone through the basics of dilutions when you you know you take your drug standard and you've got your MIG per mil CRM and how to make up a working solution. I had checked all their math and we'd done it the first time. ⁓ and then you know few months later we're, you know, repreparing some solutions. I left them to do it on their own. And then on the instrument, she's telling me, I can't see Sentinel. ⁓ there's something wrong with the instrument. So I go over to the lab and we're looking and sure enough there's nothing there. So we s we start troubleshooting and we go back and I ask her to show me her working for her dilutions. And she's diluted it ten times more than she should, which is why so there's nothing wrong with the instrument, the problem's with the calculations. ⁓ and I asked her to do some basic, you know, arithmetic in her head, or just I asked her to do something like divide a thousand by ten. And she she grabs her phone.
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: And I said I'm like, what are you doing? Dividing a thousand by ten. And I was like, Why are you doing that on your phone? My brain has more important things to do. Wow. So so yeah, so so I think there's this like I I couldn't I could not understand how somebody that's doing a master's w or somebody who's educated and is a second year master student couldn't divide a thousand by ten. I hadn't asked her to divide one thousand four hundred and seventy two by fourteen. Now that one I I probably would have picked my phone up as well, right. I'd asked her to divide a thousand by ten. And she told me that her brain had more important things to do. So I that's where I'm thinking there's there's this gap or there's something that isn't connected anymore. Like so either we as educators are failing this because you know when I was at school, we when we did our arithmetic 'cause we had ma mathematics ⁓ as a as a subject and then we had a separate class of arithmetic where we weren't allowed to use calculators. We had to do everything like long. We did our multiplication, long, we did addition, subtraction. ⁓ and division we had to do it out longhand in that particular examination, we weren't allowed calculators. And I and I don't know if that's still the same nowadays in classes and examinations. So are we missing something by not having people do this longhand? Are we becoming too reliant on calculators and not using our brains in that way? Are we not educating properly? Have the instruments become too black boxed? I I know that when when we were at Glasgow University, ⁓ we still would you know, we would teach the students to take apart and put back together sources for G Cs. ⁓ and we would do something similar with our L C instruments there just to get the students used to ⁓ the maintenance and things and we did the same ⁓ when I taught at Arcadia and we had a lot of instruments at the Center for Forensic Science Research and Education that we use and we would try as much as possible to get the students having that hands-on experience so that they knew how to troubleshoot. And I'd like to hope that most programs that have access to instrumentation are doing those kind of things with the students. But so so the anyway, the idea of we we want to create a survey where we can dig into get the perspective from students so that we know what their their thoughts are on how well they're being educated when they move from education into new positions and how well they feel that they're prepared for that. And then we want to also know from the employer's perspective how well they feel that the education system is preparing their new starts. When they come in, is our education system properly comparing these people ⁓ as maybe compared to like ten years ago or or longer, like is there is there really a gap or is is it just is it me? Am I am I got mad, you know? ⁓ but I really do feel that or or it is it that is it that the the the technology has got has advanced too quickly and or are we too reliant on our engineers? Is or is it a fiscal thing that's happening that, you know, so so What what exactly is it's happening? 'Cause I do feel that there is a shift. So what what is the shift and and and where is this? Is there really a gap or is it just a shift? And we maybe need to reset our expectations.
speaker-0: I I think I agree. I think yeah, well, I think you and I both know. I mean, just through conversations we've had with other colleagues, that it's something that always comes up in conversation, you know, whether it's a young person or ⁓ someone in the administration that does a lot of the hiring. ⁓ so I I know this is going to be something that's really useful. ⁓ I know that certainly the toxicology resource committee, it's something that it's right in our wheelhouse of being able to answer these questions and certainly provide ⁓ I think our fear is you know, you get so far down the road, you're always worried, did we lose our foundation? And ⁓ and it's really making sure that we're hitting that or ⁓ or or are we just ⁓ are we making a big deal out of something that doesn't need to be?
speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. And maybe maybe we are, right. And and I and what I don't want to do is like blame it on a blame blame it on like a generation gap, right? Because we know that like, you know that that would be an easy thing to say, ⁓ it's just it's just a new generation. It's like Gen Alpha or Gen Z or wh whatever, it's a generational thing because we know that there's there's differences in how people access technology or ⁓ you know, and we know that the education system has changed. But y what I would like to hope that even though the the way that people are being educated is changing, that the fundamental education that people are getting has remained consistent and that it's not that the education system is failing in some way. I hope that's not what's happening.
speaker-0: Well, I think it's gonna be remarkable. ⁓ I think I think what I'd like to do, ⁓ you've you've put together, I mean, there's so many I wish we had more time. you you've put together an incredible course that's available on the drugimpairment.com website where ⁓ you have it's focused on alcohol essentials and particularly the metabolism ⁓ aspect of alcohol toxicology. I think what I'd like to do is is after our interview today, ⁓ I can I can walk all of the audience through your your course and show them where it's available. As long as you don't mind. ⁓ I I always I I always I wanna make sure I don't know if you've had the chance to see the ⁓ absorption lecture in that series, but I hear the instructor is fantastic in it. ⁓ have you
speaker-1: Of course he is, Joey.
speaker-0: Be a good tag team thing if anyone wants to see ⁓ both of us ⁓ teach. If and it's a great opportunity. It's like it's like you can get Karen Scott ⁓ on demand and this is this is a big deal. one thing I can't avoid though, because it's the most popular thing that we do on the show, is our rapid fire round. And ⁓ so I hope you're prepared for this today. But what I do is I have a series of questions, some of them we've shared across guests. And ⁓ we put you we put you under a hot plate where I'm gonna ask you a question, you go with your gut. And sometimes that's just where we have to leave it, whatever your answer is. So Dr. Karen Scott, my friend, are you ready to be put in the hot plate of rapid fire toxicology questions? All right, here we go. First question best view over the course of your career. Is it Glasgow? Is it Tokyo? Or is it beautiful Birmingham, Alabama?
speaker-1: Best view is gonna be ⁓ it has to be Glasgow. My my heart's always gonna be in Glasgow. Do you want a an explanation or just an answer?
speaker-0: ⁓ you can d no, give me an explanation. We're good. We got we have two minutes on this part, so
speaker-1: Ooh, okay. ⁓ yeah, Glasgow. Yeah, I just went when I whenever I come home and it y it it would have been when I was in the car coming back and then just driving back in over the river and seeing all the bridges and everything. See the see the spire of ⁓ the university up there.
speaker-0: Yep. I I I ⁓ it makes sense. Home is always home. Your favorite forensic tool you've used over the course of your career? Is it a mass spec or is it that Beetle Room?
speaker-1: ⁓ I mean the the Beatle Rim was fun, but yeah, definitely must be it 'cause that's that's def it's gonna be the future of Fremie.
speaker-0: I d I didn't tell you th these are not going to be hard answers.
speaker-1: I'm bad they're not ⁓ hard.
speaker-0: ⁓ I I think I know this 'cause we've traveled enough together, but after all of the time that you've spent over the world, is it a proper cup of tea still or are you now a coffee person?
speaker-1: Ugh. ⁓ do you know, so for a while I actually I actually cut caffeine out so and then I had to reintroduce it. But yeah, so right now so I got I got a I got ⁓ a Q rig from my ⁓ for my Christmas and at the moment I had green tea in there. So it's ⁓ which is not a proper cup of tea, but yeah, I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna go with tea. So I a good cup of tea, so yeah.
speaker-0: I think we were in Chicago one time, ⁓ many years at somewhere along the journey and this became an issue in the hotel. ⁓ All right. So teaching style, if you've got to go back, is it the classroom lecture for you or are you more of that CSI house kind of simulation for students?
speaker-1: Yeah. ⁓ so so I do still teach. ⁓ so I I have to teach our medical residents. and so we have to do some didactic lectures and those those definitely have a place. But I I prefer I actually do a lot of one on one ⁓ teaching with with the residents. But I I really like when I have my research students and we're over in the lab and I'm doing that kind of like in front of the mass spec. So it I guess it's more with the the simulation stuff, but I I like the kind of more hands on. Yeah.
speaker-0: Yeah, I would imagine. My last question for you, and ⁓ this one is ⁓ somewhat serious on it. One word is gonna be the response for you. Can you describe the future of forensic toxicology in just one word?
speaker-1: ⁓ I clicked it.
speaker-0: Eclectic. Do you want to elaborate?
speaker-1: Can I use my phone to look up a definition?
speaker-0: I love it. No, go stick with it. Go with it.
speaker-1: I wanna look up I wanna look up the definition of eclectic on MacBook.
speaker-0: ⁓ this is fun. You're using your phone though just as a point of
speaker-1: I know, all right with them. Eclectic. ⁓ I need to do that. Eclectic, here we go. Thinking. AI overview. Here we go. Eclectic describes selecting the best elements from diverse sources, styles, or systems rather than following a single rigid approach. An eclectic person is characterized by varied open minded tastes, while in psychology it involves using multiple therapeutic techniques. Wow. So I so I think I've chosen that just because our drugs are very eclectic, right? We have our traditional stuff and then we have our new stuff that's coming out. so yeah, I I don't know. I think just because it's so varied and so different and it's so changeable, I think eclectic's a good word for the future.
speaker-0: Hearing you describe that definition, ⁓ I think it nails the field. Well done. I appreciate that. Well, Dr. Scott, what an honor to have you on here. ⁓ well, listen, hopefully we can get you back for some more. And ⁓ I does turn out that we also have to be in a a different meeting in three minutes from now. So we better end this. Hey, sounds good. Thank you, everybody. Tune into drugimpairment.com for more. See ya. Bye.
speaker-1: It's been an honor to be here, Joey. I'll say I'll see you in three minutes.
speaker-1: Yeah, well thanks for having me here, Joey. It's always great to have sit down and have a discussion with you, even though we're we're not in the same state. ⁓ sitting here on the camera with you. So and thanks for that ⁓ blushingly nice introduction. ⁓ Yeah.
speaker-0: Well, I always tell you you genuinely are. You're one of my favorite people. ⁓ just being around you often makes me feel smarter and that's that's encouraging. ⁓ but ⁓ I think even though I've known you ⁓ about a decade now, getting to sit down and actually kind of work through the how your C V there are things I didn't know about that I think even enhanced how remarkable I think of you ⁓ really starting with just, you know, your Scottish roots. Can you tell me what it's like? You got a bachelor's degree from ⁓ the University of Strathclyde, I said this correctly, right? Good. And ⁓ you can clearly tell I'm a Southern American here. we'll struggle through it. But then you earn your PhD from the University of Glasgow. What was it like kind of coming up through those programs here? ⁓ and and we're gonna try to build the journey to to you being over here in the States, but what was it like being in
speaker-1: Yes.
speaker-0: Early forensic science educator, seeing the explosion of things like CSI being an educator. Can you just kind of walk me through that?
speaker-1: Yes, so I mean forensic science, it's like like you said, forensic science ⁓ was in its infancy. ⁓ I I did my degree in the the late eighties. So ⁓ and I I feel that we were very much guinea pigs back then. The the program that I did, ⁓ I it was the second year of that program. It was a forensic and analytical chemistry degree. And and they they admitted to us that ⁓ to some degree they they didn't know what they were doing. The undergraduate degrees are very different over there. We we we don't have that ⁓ generalized education at the undergraduate level. So we we just did the the science and we had a couple of electives ⁓ within the degree, but from like nine till five, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, we were in ⁓ science classes, ⁓ mainly chemistry. We did some math and physics in there too. And I can't believe I just said math instead of maths, 'cause we call it maths in the UK. ⁓
speaker-0: You're becoming one of us.
speaker-1: Becoming American, right? ⁓ even though you wouldn't know it from my accent and our our master's programmes in the UK are also only one year and not two. so then when I moved into my my PhD program, I also didn't then need the the bridging science classes within the PhD program. So PhD programs in the UK are also a little bit different in that you don't have the the science classes to support the education piece of the PhD, it's just the the research that you do. So it's a three year program. You do three years worth of ⁓ bench research and the the classes that you take or the courses that you take to underpin the PhD are just the kind of ⁓ research based classes. ⁓ we did a first aid class as well, but it was really just you know how to write a thesis, ⁓ how to do literature searching, those types of classes that you take within the the PhD. So it's so yeah, very, very different from the education system over here, I would say. The the other thing that happened when when I was a student was that we were only really grading on the final exam. So there was a lot of pressure on that final thing at the end of the semester. There was no ⁓ you know, you got, you know, twenty percent of your grade for writing an essay or twenty percent of your grade for ⁓ a midterm. Everything was really based on that final exam. And I think a lot of the the courses from teaching in the UK, ⁓ it's a lot more ⁓ spread out now. Then they have changed how the education system works over there now compared with what it was when I was a student ⁓ in the eighties and early nineties.
speaker-0: Yeah. Well that's that's interesting. You know, I I I'd like desperately needed to kind of build up a pool of points before the final exam because of the damage that I would cause to my grade during that time. I ⁓ I would have been an anxious mess doing that.
speaker-1: Yeah, and and I think a lot of students who are very practical based are very good ⁓ with the the lab based ⁓ piece of it. ⁓ which you know when you're when you're in a job, right, if you're a bench scientist and you're actually very practical, we got no credit for that at all. We had to obviously pass the labs, you know, you wrote up your lab at the end of the you know, the end of the day and then handed in your lab book and you got it graded. ⁓ but that didn't count at all. ⁓ you just had to turn up and, you know, if you had ten labs ⁓ in that section of the semester you had to hand them all in, but they didn't count for anything. So you could be the best lab s lab based student and really do badly in exams and essentially fail your degree. ⁓ so it was it was a really weird, particularly for something like chemistry, which is so practical. And the only thing that was getting you to pass was not understanding the theory. So it was it was very weird back at that that time, or at least in the degree that I did.
speaker-0: ⁓ I bet I I'm curious. Like, did you know kind of from the jump that that forensic toxicology was what you wanted to do? ⁓ it
speaker-1: I think when No ⁓ So I knew that I liked the analytical piece of it. I liked the the instrumentation side. And when we got when we finally got to the the forensic part, 'cause we didn't really start doing the forensic piece. So the the way that the degree was structured, it was in the Department of Pure and Applied Chemistry. So the first three years were really just following the structure of the the pure chemistry degree. And then when we got into the the final year, we really started doing here's your forensic piece of this ⁓ undergraduate program. ⁓ so you know, we we learned about DNA and we learned about ⁓ drug chemistry, we learned about fibers, we did some microscopy, which I really didn't like. I got a headache every time I looked down a microscope. And then we did toxicology and I was like, ⁓ I like this part. ⁓ because I, you know, I liked like I said, I liked analytical chemistry. So I think that was where I I felt most at home within forensic science. ⁓ and then I I got the opportunity to do my PhD in forensic toxicology. So I think that's that's definitely where I felt most at home. I I knew I didn't want to be a DNA person. And I think even back then, ⁓ that was the area of forensic science where most people got most excited, right? That was the bit that solved crimes. DNA fingerprints, that type of thing was what mo it is what most people think of as forensic science. So ⁓ but I I think I always liked the the drugs and the toxicology section more. I I didn't wanna look at people's states.
speaker-0: Yeah, absolutely. I I I'm curious to get your opinion. I I've often told people, and maybe it's just the way that I'm wired. My dad traveled ⁓ all over the world growing up and I feel like that was just kind of hardwired into me that ⁓ I went pretty far away to undergraduate compared to where I lived. And ⁓ I I would assume if Scotland or Tokyo would have offered me a job, I probably would end up there. I just never felt like a physical ⁓ restraint and and I looked through you know, looking at your journey, you know, you leave Scotland, you go to Tokyo, Japan. That's something that is incredibly uncommon. Are you built hardwired to travel or is that just a logical next step in your career?
speaker-1: So it it's weird that you say that because I originally I I I wanted to do medicine but when I was when I was eighteen, nineteen, I actually didn't want to leave home. I I was very kind of rooted ⁓ w at my parents' house. I I did get accepted to medical school but it would have it would have meant leaving home because the the medical school at Glasgow University I it was very, very competitive and I didn't get in there. So to go to medical school would have meant leaving home and I I wasn't ready. I I was kind of shy, retiring and and just scared of the prospect of leaving my parents' house. ⁓ but by the time I I finished my undergraduate degree, you know, I I moved out of my parents' home. I was still I still stayed local. I went to Glasgow University because that's where the the PhD opportunity was. But I I did move out and I moved into an apartment in in Glasgow. And then by the time I finished that the postdoc opportunity came up and I I was definitely at that point ⁓ ready to spread my wings and and travel. But during my my time as an undergraduate student, I did travel. I I moved away in the summers and got summer jobs to to start earning some money and things like that. So by then I was happy to, you know, to to leave home more. But ⁓ and you know, I did have some regrets at being that kind of scared eighteen, nineteen year old and not maybe going to medical school and ⁓ you know, wonder, you know, you have that kind of like two paths and if you take this one rather than this one, I'm thinking now even like what what would I be doing now had I actually just taken that step and and gone to because I I got into two different medical schools. One was down in England. ⁓ and I could have still stayed with family. I had family near the one the one school in England. ⁓ You know, just wondering, you know, would w because I wanted to be a forensic pathologist, strangely. ⁓ you know, where where would I be now? What would I be doing had I just taken that alternative pathway?
speaker-0: Yeah. Tell tell me about Tokyo being there. Were you were you with people that you knew, or is this just y you on a whim by yourself figure life out?
speaker-1: Yeah, so ⁓ I had I had two two paths at that so everywhere I'd gone from from that point onwards there was always two options. So I got offered a job at a lab in Wales ⁓ to to set up ⁓ a testing lab there and then I got offered the postdoc in in Tokyo. ⁓ and my you know my my dad was like, Take the job in Wales, you know, you you can't go all the way to Tokyo So I you know you know after some hard thinking I I made the decision to to stay on the more kind of I guess academic path and I yeah, so I you know, I I I I went to Tokyo and that was probably the scariest thing I've I've ever done. I like, you know, yeah, I didn't know anybody there. I had met I met the the head of the lab, so the PI of the lab at a conference, but that that was it. I didn't know anybody else there. So He picked me up at the airport. He dropped me off at they had the Olympic park. that because they'd had the the Winter Olympics, I guess, there, the the year before, a couple of years before, and that was still situated. So he dropped me off the, you know, picked me up at the airport. We went for something to eat, and he just dropped me off. So there I was, you know, on my own in Tokyo. I had I didn't speak Japanese. I'd been in Japan once for a conference. ⁓ so at least I knew roughly what the layout was. ⁓ you know, I was so I was sitting in my room and I was starving. ⁓ I knew roughly how to get to the nearest ⁓ subway system. So I got off at a random subway stop and got up and then I saw the big yellow ⁓ of McDonald's. I had my first kneel online Tokyo was McDonald's. I didn't know what else to do. So I had I had McDonald's.
speaker-0: It it's like an anchor for many of us. It's like, Okay, you're gonna dump, you're gonna be
speaker-1: But yeah, so I you know, I saw all these other restaurants and that, you know, everything's written in Japanese and I I had no clue what to do. So I yeah, I had McDonald's for my very first mail in Tokyo on my own. But and ⁓ you know, the next morning ⁓ he you know he picked me up and took me to my apartment and showed me how to get from my apartment to work the next day and ⁓ from there on it was it was yeah, it was it was interesting. But they 'cause I was there as part of a fellowship, they had you know, magazine that came out ⁓ once once a month and it had contact information for the other fellows who were there. So I I I reached out to other people because the the first month was very much I would get up in the morning, I would go to work, I would be there before my boss, I would stay there until my boss left and then I would go home. I I I didn't have ⁓ a social life. And then maybe once every couple of weeks the people in my lab would go out after the lab, but you know, it my social life died and I'm quite a social person. So but then we would still be home at the same time that we would be home if we were working because they had families and you know their own lives, you know. So eventually I just I got in contact with a group of people from the the magazine to say help. Help needed a Scottish girl in Tokyo ⁓ requires social life. I have a kind of help female. ⁓ and then I found a group of people ⁓ that lived in Tokyo because the the the fellowship was for the entirety of ⁓ Japan. So I found the ones that were living in the Tokyo area ⁓ and I found a friend group that way. And it it kind of took off from there. Originally I was supposed to be in Tokyo for one year and I ended up extending my fellowship and I stayed there for For two years.
speaker-0: Incredible. What a great.
speaker-1: I I had a fantastic time in in Japan. I I really, really enjoyed my time there.
speaker-0: But it's it's one of the themes that I think we've talked about with some of the other guests that ⁓ aren't equally talented, ⁓ where, you know, you can go someplace, you learn a lot about yourself, you learn how to how to grow in areas maybe that are not comfortable to you. And it's okay to know that that's not ⁓ where you're not supposed to be. You know, long term you can you take that with you and I think that helps refine what you really want in life. Can you so I I'm trying to build a bridge ultimately to to twenty sixteen when you and I met. There's there's a time gap. Can you kind of give us the brief view of of the transition after postdoc? Where were you and how did that lead to you coming over to the United States?
speaker-1: So so from from Tokyo. ⁓ so that that was that was interesting. So yeah, so I was there ⁓ like I said, I was there for two years. ⁓ and then when it was time to leave, you know, so I I trained as a forensic toxicologist, I you know, I had some publications and then, you know, ultimately I I wanted to I wanted to come back to the UK ⁓ and get a job as a forensic toxicologist. So they had at the time there was a book of all of the laboratories. ⁓ i I think it was a an international book of of forensic labs. ⁓ so I just started writing to all of the labs to say, hey, this is me, here's my here's my resume, C V and I I knew that I wanted to go somewhere where English was the the first language. I'm not I'm not an I don't have a natural gift for foreign languages. We as part of my as part of my postdoc, ⁓ I went to Japanese lessons, but I I never really picked up the language very well. And one of the reasons why this postdoc existed in Japan was that they wanted English speaking people to work with them to help them with publications in English. So there was never a big push for the people in my lab to speak Japanese with me, so I wasn't speaking Japanese on a daily basis particularly. ⁓ so I I knew I wanted to go somewhere that English was the the primary language. I also ⁓ unfortunately at the time knew that I didn't want to go to America because I'd had a bad summer experience in nineteen ninety one, ⁓ where I worked at a lab up in Pennsylvania. ⁓ the ⁓ that we don't need to go into that in any detail here. But I I didn't want to come to the States at that point. So ⁓ I was applying to jobs in Canada, I applied to jobs in Australia and obviously back in the UK. And every single place that I applied to told me that I was overqualified. So I I felt like at that point that I might have made a mistake ⁓ by first of all doing the PhD and then by doing the postdoc because I think the the feeling was that
speaker-0: Wow.
speaker-1: I I think a lot of people felt like I was gunning for their jobs. Because I wanted to I wanted to be a bench scientist, right? I wanted to actually go in and be a forensic toxicologist working at the bench. So and this is something that I've I've talked with my students about is just be careful not to overqualify yourself or go in with the expectations because I have students obviously who want to go into PhD programs, you know, they get their masters and then they want to go on and do a PhD is just to Be realistic about what your expectations are for getting a job at the end of that. Think about what your career is going to look like down the line if you go and do a PhD. You know, what what what is your expectation of your career path after that? Right. If if you want an if you want to be an academic, that's a good idea. If you want to be a bench scientist, think carefully ⁓ about what your expectations are in doing that. So
speaker-0: Yeah, that's wise advice. That comes up a lot, you know. I mean, especially being on the other side and hiring now. I I've seen those conversations trickle in where you go through a list of candidates. And I wonder, you know, I think at least over my career in in twenty in two thousand and eight we had the the financial crisis. Mm-hmm. And then of course COVID. And so you had these kind of dead years where either people were let go from jobs or they were trying to transition into something. And I think a lot of lot of our colleagues started advancing their education. ⁓ it was a perfect time to go get a a master's degree or something and yeah. ⁓ it might have not panned out the way that they wanted to, ⁓ because of what you were describing.
speaker-1: Yeah, ⁓ you know, so so it was tough. ⁓ but I I definitely don't regret it now. ⁓ but it did it did push me into the next step in in my career where I ended up being being an academic. But ⁓ and and you know, I've I've said I always have ended up with these two two things happening. So simultaneously it's ⁓ I I I ended up moving back to I moved back to Scotland, I ended up moving back into my p my parents and you know, kept on applying for jobs and thankfully ⁓ the situation only lasted for a couple of months. So I applied for a couple of jobs. They were both down in England and I interviewed for a consultancy company and ⁓ an academic position and got offered them both at the same time. ⁓ so I had another choice to make. So ⁓ say again.
speaker-0: No, I said always two, so there's your two choices.
speaker-1: Always came into it, right? So ⁓ so I had the opportunity to either ⁓ take on a position as a consultant, forensic toxicologist, or to take on a position in academia. So ⁓ that time I I chose academia. So again out of my comfort zone at the time I I didn't I'd always said I didn't want to be a teacher. Both of my parents ⁓ had teaching positions. I saw how stressed it made them. and and here I am with, you know, I don't know how many years of ⁓ teaching under my belt and more than I more than I like to to count. So ⁓ so that started my academic career back in ⁓ what, two thousand. ⁓ I started my career as an educator.
speaker-0: Incredible. Ten years ago I get the chance to ⁓ I actually drove. I was living in Columbus, Ohio at the time. And ⁓ we had a colleague, good friend of both of ours, Frank Carro. We love Frank. Yes. And Frank had ⁓ text me at the time and asked if I would be willing to come out to Arcadia. And ⁓ I I we spoke about something, I have no idea what it was. I can't recall it off the top of my head. But ⁓ there's where I met Dr. Karen Scott at an incredible event that we had. You got to teach, I got to teach. ⁓ it's pretty special getting in front of that crowd. ⁓ what do you remember about that day?
speaker-1: About that. That particular day I probably been running around like a headless chicken 'cause it was feeling a bit chaotic 'cause I was hosting it. I
speaker-0: Yeah. I am a very nice. So I'll you what I remember. Yeah, so so yeah, so we get ⁓ we get to this I mean the class was the class for you know, it was it was a nice typical university setting. And then at some point it transitions over to the most bizarre thing I've ever seen on a forensic science ⁓ campus. Where you go to this yeah, too far from like the university itself, you you had some form of like a rental house that
speaker-1: Afterwards I know. ⁓ we owned it, the university owned the house.
speaker-0: ⁓ is that what it was? So the university owned the house, but it was just like a neighborhood house.
speaker-1: Yes, ⁓ they owned all of the houses along that street.
speaker-0: And that house was completely converted into a forensic science art exhibit. Essentially. The the living room was a crime scene. Of which I have a picture of you, me, and I believe Sabre with a ⁓ dummy that had been shot in the head. And then at one point and I'll never forget this.
speaker-1: Yes.
speaker-0: Like upstairs in a closet there were aquariums of what I remember were like beetles chewing on things. It was ⁓ it was creepy. It was a ho house of horrors ⁓ at this school. Do you r did were you part of setting that entire thing up?
speaker-1: possibly. I mean, we we used the house for several different functions. I was pivotal in getting us that house. So when when I started, ⁓ when I took over as the director of the program, we th they they had a a a kind of basement room that they used as the the kind of crime scene space. And ⁓ that whole that whole space was been taken over as the alumni house and they were taking away our crime scene space. So I I, you know, so various conversations with the administration at the university I said, like, we can't have a forensic size program without a crime scene space. And we have a crime scene investigation class, we have a patterns class, but we use that space for and we also use it as part of our recruitment and process. We use it during open houses and and things like that. And we can also use it for ⁓ bringing in like high school groups and things like that. So I don't care where you give us as a space, but we have to have a space. And and so they gave us a house. So it was we went from like this one room underneath the staircase to having the entire house. So for for a little bit of time we shared it with an they had an architect on campus because they were doing some building projects and things. So for a while we we shared it with an architect. He had one of the the levels in the house. ⁓ and then I I think even so today we share it with the the paramedics 'cause there's they have a a requirement to have a a certain ⁓ time limit in terms of how quickly we can get an ambulance to anywhere on campus because they they do have resident students on campus. ⁓ so which which makes it look all the more authentic, right? Because there's an ambulance sitting out there all the time unless it's actually in use. ⁓ but yeah, so we we have that. There's a kitchen area, there's a dining room area, there's a living room area, and then there's two bedrooms and an attic space in there as well. So it it's a really nice facility. and then we you know we went to various charity shops and you know anybody that had stuff that they were getting rid of we just we just brought it in and tried to make it look pretty. One of the one of the latest I'll get to the bug area but one one of the one of the the girls in the English department, her husband works as a a movie producer, so he came and did some of the staging and things for us as well. So it it turned it turned out really good. But yes, the the bug area. ⁓ so we we have flesh eating beetles up there. Or we have flesh eating beetles, but they only eat dead flesh. So they they were never gonna hurt an individual who came in there, but we could use it to scare
speaker-0: Peter.
speaker-1: ⁓ some of the school groups. If we had kids that weren't behaving, we could help them, we were going to feed them to the flesh eating Brutex butt
speaker-0: Yeah. But i i it was it was quite eye opening. I remember I remember at the time thinking to myself, I'm like, this is the only place I've ever heard that recruits bugs into a house. Most of the time we're trying to
speaker-1: Yeah, we definitely didn't want any exterminators coming in there. That would not have been a good thing.
speaker-0: ⁓ yeah. ⁓ goodness. Well it it was really special ⁓ to be a part of that. I I never thought that that day would end up being ⁓ such a catalyst for personally my career. ⁓ as as I shared, you know, I mean and I think I mixed it up in the beginning. ⁓ you've been a greater friend than colleague ⁓ a co ⁓ over the course of my ⁓ career and ⁓ and and so it's been ⁓ it's been quite a joy. I never thought that, you know, here we are t over ten years later, ⁓ still getting to interface because ⁓ there was a flesh eating bug on a campus one in you know in Pennsylvania somewhere. it's unique because you know you built kind of your foundation and and for me you've always been that resource of someone who is directly plugged in with education of forensic science on a collegiate level in in the United States. ⁓ incoming students that ⁓ are are getting educated. And yet you go through another kind of transition in your career where ⁓ or now you're back in the laboratory in Birmingham, Alabama, of all places. I'm guessing when you were in Tokyo, Birmingham wasn't on the map of ⁓ what was next in my career. Tell me about this kind of new phase and and what life is like being in the laboratory
speaker-1: I know right. Yeah, so It is it's definitely different. I think I I didn't ⁓ it's not it's not like I I burned out. I think that this was just another this was another opportunity, right? And it happened because of one of the classes at Arcadia. ⁓ we had a seminar class and they had invited one of the medical examiners from that I that I worked with now, they'd invited them to come up and talk to the students. And while they were one of the medical examiners was speaking one of their colleagues was in the ⁓ the chat room. So this was during COVID. Mm-hmm. And then ⁓ she's private chatting me and she's You're a forensic toxicologist, aren't you? Yes. And she's like, Can we set up a s a separate time to have a chit chat afterwards? Yes, we can. ⁓ so they were their current ⁓ director was retiring and they needed a replacement. And I think she just got me at a a a time where I was feeling the need to get back into being a practitioner, I was missing this part of my career because when I worked to I so after I left my first academic appointment, I actually went back to Glasgow University where ⁓ I had done my PhD and and there I had a a kind of triple role. I set up a master's in forensic toxicology program, but I was also a practitioner at the same time. So it was a kind of split bowl. working as a forensic toxicologist with the medical examiners teaching. And then we also had ⁓ a research role ⁓ there as well. And when I came over to Arcadia, that was mainly a teaching role with some research. And I I wasn't really doing any practitioner work other than my consultancy. And because I'd been there, I think at the time around eight years, I felt that if I didn't get back into being a practitioner, I was going to essentially lose those practitioner skills to the point where I was never going to be able to go back to doing that. So I think she she got me at that perfect time of if I don't do it now, I'm never going to make that jump back. ⁓ so I said, Okay okay, you know, tell me more about this. She said, well why don't you come, you know, you know, come down, see us, come down in the summer because I don't know if you're gonna handle the heat with Alabama. ⁓ and it g it gets warm in in the northeast as as you know. but I think when they brought me down it was the coldest summer they'd ever had. So and I I was actually able to wander around with a cardigan on and I was like, I don't know what you're talking about. It's not that warm down here compared with what we get up in the Philly, New Jersey area. and yeah, so I came and I looked at the lab and I thought, Well, y you need some you need some resources here, but this is fine and everybody's friendly and the food's good and so and you know, a year and a half later I I made the move ⁓ to leave Arcadia and I helped them work through 'cause they were about to go through their re accreditation. So I helped them with that process, made sure that they were in a good situation and I made the move to come through. So that was my next kind of I could stay or I could leave and I I made the decision to leave and and come down to Alabama. So
speaker-0: W with you being in Alabama, I I'm not too far away, not terribly far away in the state of Louisiana. I absolutely I consider myself your neighbor. ⁓ summers are quite ⁓ brutal though. They they you smartened up to a hot ⁓ southern summer, right? No? Yeah.
speaker-1: Yeah, you're you're my neighbour now, right? Yeah, yeah, but I j I just don't go outside. I I I take vitamin D and I stay inside.
speaker-0: I I I tell people all the time that and I say this about Louisiana, but quite frankly, if I lived in Alabama, I'd say the same thing. The state bird is a mosquito. And ⁓ they are ⁓ they're giant You know, they might have something they claim. No, it's the mosquitoes. They're everywhere and ⁓ summers are brutal for sure.
speaker-1: Well so the mos the mosquitoes down here don't actually bother me. The the mosquitoes in ⁓ New Jersey they they like me. The the ones down here, I I think th I think they realize that my blood is polluted by the New Jersey mosquitoes and the ones down here they're reverse to that for some reason. I I'm not
speaker-0: feel like a new Jersey mosquito's got like an edge, you know, that ⁓ the world ⁓ the world of of mosquitoes, the Jersey mosquitoes.
speaker-1: That's an age. Definitely has the edge. But I haven't I haven't I haven't actually encountered the Alabama mosquitoes yet. They they seem to ⁓ don't like my blood, partly. They don't like Scottish blood.
speaker-0: Yeah. Well th I would imagine they love the football teams. So ⁓ goodness. Well you know, this I this kind of what I really wanted to focus on ⁓ with the time we have left. I know we only have about maybe ten minutes. of everyone that I know in the field of forensic toxicology, ⁓ to me you're one of the the very few that you you've kind of had the responsibility of educating the people that we try to hire and bring into the labs. Then you're on the front lines working in the lab and seeing ⁓ maybe ⁓ strengths and hurdles. And I'm not implying that your sta this is anything that's going on with your staff, but that you've seen kind of what what happens when individuals go and they're educated collegiately in forensic science. ⁓ it it seems like a a great opportunity. And I know this is a project that we've discussed working on. You're ⁓ heading up with a committee you and I are both on with ⁓ the Society of Forensic Toxicologists, the Toxicology Resource Committee, of really being someone who can truly identify areas that are missing in ⁓ in education and things that we need. Can you talk a little bit, ⁓ maybe for a few minutes about ⁓ about the education gap survey and and kind of the background on that and what kind of led to maybe some something we want to try to ⁓ put out this year.
speaker-1: Yeah, absolutely. So so this actually it came about from from two different angles. So the first one was on a a conversation that I got involved with on LinkedIn. ⁓ this was a a colleague had posted about the the way that the instruments are becoming more black box. So I r I remember you know, from when I was doing my PhD and it know, with the instruments they were kind of forward facing. And when I was training, being able to be very hands on and ⁓ like on my HPLC, doing a lot of the repairs and things myself. So I knew what a check valve looked like, I knew what a pump seal looked like. And if those parts of the instrument needed to be replaced or repaired, doing that myself. ⁓ whereas those instruments now are very much those parts are very hidden. just because they've become much more sophisticated. And if I had to you know, if you need a lot of those repairs done now, you have to call an engineer in because they're kinda lock and keyed in in the back facing part of the instrument. So you typically don't change those things out or maybe they don't need to be changed out so often now. ⁓ but those things are still in the instruments and maybe you learn theoretically what they do and what they're there for or ⁓ or maybe you don't. Maybe we don't typically teach those components when we're in in on the education side anymore. ⁓ so the comment on LinkedIn was ⁓ was very much about how a lot of these instruments that we're moving over to in the labs, like the LC MS MS or LCQ Top MS, are becoming black boxes because we're We're very much plug and play. Like our analysts know how to put the samples into the auto sampler and then press play, right? But when it comes down to troubleshooting, they really don't know how to do those parts. And there's a a kind of move to just call on the engineer to get them to fix, right? Rather than using your staff to do that. The the second thing that happened was an interaction with one of my research students here at UMEB, where ⁓ you know, I had asked them to ⁓ we had we had gone through the basics of dilutions when you you know you take your drug standard and you've got your MIG per mil CRM and how to make up a working solution. I had checked all their math and we'd done it the first time. ⁓ and then you know few months later we're, you know, repreparing some solutions. I left them to do it on their own. And then on the instrument, she's telling me, I can't see Sentinel. ⁓ there's something wrong with the instrument. So I go over to the lab and we're looking and sure enough there's nothing there. So we s we start troubleshooting and we go back and I ask her to show me her working for her dilutions. And she's diluted it ten times more than she should, which is why so there's nothing wrong with the instrument, the problem's with the calculations. ⁓ and I asked her to do some basic, you know, arithmetic in her head, or just I asked her to do something like divide a thousand by ten. And she she grabs her phone.
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: And I said I'm like, what are you doing? Dividing a thousand by ten. And I was like, Why are you doing that on your phone? My brain has more important things to do. Wow. So so yeah, so so I think there's this like I I couldn't I could not understand how somebody that's doing a master's w or somebody who's educated and is a second year master student couldn't divide a thousand by ten. I hadn't asked her to divide one thousand four hundred and seventy two by fourteen. Now that one I I probably would have picked my phone up as well, right. I'd asked her to divide a thousand by ten. And she told me that her brain had more important things to do. So I that's where I'm thinking there's there's this gap or there's something that isn't connected anymore. Like so either we as educators are failing this because you know when I was at school, we when we did our arithmetic 'cause we had ma mathematics ⁓ as a as a subject and then we had a separate class of arithmetic where we weren't allowed to use calculators. We had to do everything like long. We did our multiplication, long, we did addition, subtraction. ⁓ and division we had to do it out longhand in that particular examination, we weren't allowed calculators. And I and I don't know if that's still the same nowadays in classes and examinations. So are we missing something by not having people do this longhand? Are we becoming too reliant on calculators and not using our brains in that way? Are we not educating properly? Have the instruments become too black boxed? I I know that when when we were at Glasgow University, ⁓ we still would you know, we would teach the students to take apart and put back together sources for G Cs. ⁓ and we would do something similar with our L C instruments there just to get the students used to ⁓ the maintenance and things and we did the same ⁓ when I taught at Arcadia and we had a lot of instruments at the Center for Forensic Science Research and Education that we use and we would try as much as possible to get the students having that hands-on experience so that they knew how to troubleshoot. And I'd like to hope that most programs that have access to instrumentation are doing those kind of things with the students. But so so the anyway, the idea of we we want to create a survey where we can dig into get the perspective from students so that we know what their their thoughts are on how well they're being educated when they move from education into new positions and how well they feel that they're prepared for that. And then we want to also know from the employer's perspective how well they feel that the education system is preparing their new starts. When they come in, is our education system properly comparing these people ⁓ as maybe compared to like ten years ago or or longer, like is there is there really a gap or is is it just is it me? Am I am I got mad, you know? ⁓ but I really do feel that or or it is it that is it that the the the technology has got has advanced too quickly and or are we too reliant on our engineers? Is or is it a fiscal thing that's happening that, you know, so so What what exactly is it's happening? 'Cause I do feel that there is a shift. So what what is the shift and and and where is this? Is there really a gap or is it just a shift? And we maybe need to reset our expectations.
speaker-0: I I think I agree. I think yeah, well, I think you and I both know. I mean, just through conversations we've had with other colleagues, that it's something that always comes up in conversation, you know, whether it's a young person or ⁓ someone in the administration that does a lot of the hiring. ⁓ so I I know this is going to be something that's really useful. ⁓ I know that certainly the toxicology resource committee, it's something that it's right in our wheelhouse of being able to answer these questions and certainly provide ⁓ I think our fear is you know, you get so far down the road, you're always worried, did we lose our foundation? And ⁓ and it's really making sure that we're hitting that or ⁓ or or are we just ⁓ are we making a big deal out of something that doesn't need to be?
speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. And maybe maybe we are, right. And and I and what I don't want to do is like blame it on a blame blame it on like a generation gap, right? Because we know that like, you know that that would be an easy thing to say, ⁓ it's just it's just a new generation. It's like Gen Alpha or Gen Z or wh whatever, it's a generational thing because we know that there's there's differences in how people access technology or ⁓ you know, and we know that the education system has changed. But y what I would like to hope that even though the the way that people are being educated is changing, that the fundamental education that people are getting has remained consistent and that it's not that the education system is failing in some way. I hope that's not what's happening.
speaker-0: Well, I think it's gonna be remarkable. ⁓ I think I think what I'd like to do, ⁓ you've you've put together, I mean, there's so many I wish we had more time. you you've put together an incredible course that's available on the drugimpairment.com website where ⁓ you have it's focused on alcohol essentials and particularly the metabolism ⁓ aspect of alcohol toxicology. I think what I'd like to do is is after our interview today, ⁓ I can I can walk all of the audience through your your course and show them where it's available. As long as you don't mind. ⁓ I I always I I always I wanna make sure I don't know if you've had the chance to see the ⁓ absorption lecture in that series, but I hear the instructor is fantastic in it. ⁓ have you
speaker-1: Of course he is, Joey.
speaker-0: Be a good tag team thing if anyone wants to see ⁓ both of us ⁓ teach. If and it's a great opportunity. It's like it's like you can get Karen Scott ⁓ on demand and this is this is a big deal. one thing I can't avoid though, because it's the most popular thing that we do on the show, is our rapid fire round. And ⁓ so I hope you're prepared for this today. But what I do is I have a series of questions, some of them we've shared across guests. And ⁓ we put you we put you under a hot plate where I'm gonna ask you a question, you go with your gut. And sometimes that's just where we have to leave it, whatever your answer is. So Dr. Karen Scott, my friend, are you ready to be put in the hot plate of rapid fire toxicology questions? All right, here we go. First question best view over the course of your career. Is it Glasgow? Is it Tokyo? Or is it beautiful Birmingham, Alabama?
speaker-1: Best view is gonna be ⁓ it has to be Glasgow. My my heart's always gonna be in Glasgow. Do you want a an explanation or just an answer?
speaker-0: ⁓ you can d no, give me an explanation. We're good. We got we have two minutes on this part, so
speaker-1: Ooh, okay. ⁓ yeah, Glasgow. Yeah, I just went when I whenever I come home and it y it it would have been when I was in the car coming back and then just driving back in over the river and seeing all the bridges and everything. See the see the spire of ⁓ the university up there.
speaker-0: Yep. I I I ⁓ it makes sense. Home is always home. Your favorite forensic tool you've used over the course of your career? Is it a mass spec or is it that Beetle Room?
speaker-1: ⁓ I mean the the Beatle Rim was fun, but yeah, definitely must be it 'cause that's that's def it's gonna be the future of Fremie.
speaker-0: I d I didn't tell you th these are not going to be hard answers.
speaker-1: I'm bad they're not ⁓ hard.
speaker-0: ⁓ I I think I know this 'cause we've traveled enough together, but after all of the time that you've spent over the world, is it a proper cup of tea still or are you now a coffee person?
speaker-1: Ugh. ⁓ do you know, so for a while I actually I actually cut caffeine out so and then I had to reintroduce it. But yeah, so right now so I got I got a I got ⁓ a Q rig from my ⁓ for my Christmas and at the moment I had green tea in there. So it's ⁓ which is not a proper cup of tea, but yeah, I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna go with tea. So I a good cup of tea, so yeah.
speaker-0: I think we were in Chicago one time, ⁓ many years at somewhere along the journey and this became an issue in the hotel. ⁓ All right. So teaching style, if you've got to go back, is it the classroom lecture for you or are you more of that CSI house kind of simulation for students?
speaker-1: Yeah. ⁓ so so I do still teach. ⁓ so I I have to teach our medical residents. and so we have to do some didactic lectures and those those definitely have a place. But I I prefer I actually do a lot of one on one ⁓ teaching with with the residents. But I I really like when I have my research students and we're over in the lab and I'm doing that kind of like in front of the mass spec. So it I guess it's more with the the simulation stuff, but I I like the kind of more hands on. Yeah.
speaker-0: Yeah, I would imagine. My last question for you, and ⁓ this one is ⁓ somewhat serious on it. One word is gonna be the response for you. Can you describe the future of forensic toxicology in just one word?
speaker-1: ⁓ I clicked it.
speaker-0: Eclectic. Do you want to elaborate?
speaker-1: Can I use my phone to look up a definition?
speaker-0: I love it. No, go stick with it. Go with it.
speaker-1: I wanna look up I wanna look up the definition of eclectic on MacBook.
speaker-0: ⁓ this is fun. You're using your phone though just as a point of
speaker-1: I know, all right with them. Eclectic. ⁓ I need to do that. Eclectic, here we go. Thinking. AI overview. Here we go. Eclectic describes selecting the best elements from diverse sources, styles, or systems rather than following a single rigid approach. An eclectic person is characterized by varied open minded tastes, while in psychology it involves using multiple therapeutic techniques. Wow. So I so I think I've chosen that just because our drugs are very eclectic, right? We have our traditional stuff and then we have our new stuff that's coming out. so yeah, I I don't know. I think just because it's so varied and so different and it's so changeable, I think eclectic's a good word for the future.
speaker-0: Hearing you describe that definition, ⁓ I think it nails the field. Well done. I appreciate that. Well, Dr. Scott, what an honor to have you on here. ⁓ well, listen, hopefully we can get you back for some more. And ⁓ I does turn out that we also have to be in a a different meeting in three minutes from now. So we better end this. Hey, sounds good. Thank you, everybody. Tune into drugimpairment.com for more. See ya. Bye.
speaker-1: It's been an honor to be here, Joey. I'll say I'll see you in three minutes.
