Medicine and GAA mix well for O’Hanlon

ARMAGH footballer Caroline O’Hanlon didn’t envisage the kind of schedule she would have when she first decided to pursue medicine. While many GAA people tend to choose careers that facilitate their sporting commitments, her choice of profession was inspired by her favourite subjects in school. Worries about how the job might compromise her sport were never really considered. Veterinary was a potential candidate at one point, before she eventually settled on the hectic working life of a doctor. Additionally, the 33-year-old is also an accomplished international handball player who travels over to the UK a few times a week during the height of her season to play in the British Superleague with her team the Scottish Sirens. She’s now into her final year of GP training in Down, which will make things easier in terms of keeping everything in a steady balance. ‘You have to think really months in advance of potential games and try to get a swap. It’s a lot of juggling. ‘I was hospital-based for about five or six years before that (GP training), so it’s a little bit easier that I don’t have to work weekends. It’s just the distance to the practise means that I’m further away from training but it should be fine. ‘I still work in the wards occasionally, but not as part of my regular job.’ O’Hanlon is also Northern Ireland’s most capped netball player and the pinnacle of her career in the sport arrived in 2014, when she represented Northern Ireland in the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. She is back in the Armagh jersey today, as she faces a stiff contest against Munster champions Kerry in an All-Ireland quarter-final. ‘I’ll just take it as it comes. We’ve had a few serious injuries with Armagh this season, so you just reassess. ‘Obviously, we’ve got the Commonwealth Games coming up in April. That’s on my horizon for the minute, but I haven’t looked beyond that.’