How I achieved being published in an academic journal

Thomas Walker joined Advo Health as a Disability Assessor in September 2021 and now works as a Clinical Operations Manager supporting Great Yarmouth and Bury St Edmunds clinics as part of the Northeast region. He has recently had an article published in an academic journal and here he describes how he achieved this.

Since leaving university after never really being interested in academia I set myself the goal of getting an article published. I wanted to prove to myself that if I wanted this badly enough then it would be something I could achieve. 

The article focuses on the importance of exercise after a heart transplant with the main take away being that most patients post heart transplant have poor adherence long term to exercise. Within this population there is research that supports exercise as a key factor in reducing chance of rejection of the new organ and other complications that can arise from this procedure. 

I often set myself challenges to keep me progressing and getting an article published was one that I was keen to achieve. The first piece of research in building a case for funding came from my previous role as Deputy Team Lead for the heart and lung transplant team, we were hoping to build a clinic around follow up for these population groups. Since this time, follow up services have been set up and appear to be functioning well in increasing participation and adherence.  

When I found out my article got published I felt elated, relieved and thankful as I knew that all the hours of proof reading and writing were worth it. Also, this experience will stay with me forever which means I could write another article again in the future. 

For anyone who is thinking about publishing an article then you should just go for it as you learn so much through the process. It really helps with the way you approach other research when guiding clinical practice and even helps when interpreting information in everyday life. The biggest thing I have learnt from this experience is how to be more critical in my thinking, for example looking at where the information is sourced and the potential for bias. 

If you are interested in reading the article it has been published in Vol 54, Issue 3 of the Journal of the Association of Chartered Physiotherapists in Respiratory Care (ACPRC) which can be found here.