Heartbeat: Going behind the lens with Mr Manish Pandit

January 13, 2020

By day, Manish Pandit is a Consultant in Nuclear Medicine. He’s also an honorary senior clinical lecturer at the University of Birmingham and a senior academy tutor with City Hospital. When he isn’t working in the department, he can be found wielding a camera, following his other passion, film producing.

Manish uses his film making skills to provide information about Trust activities and to promote public health. He said: “The work I do about our Trust resonates with my thinking about humanity, it has to be served. This is my way of doing my bit and I’d like to do much more.”

When asked how he finds time to fit this all in alongside his day job he said: “I record videos for free in my own time at weekends. If it’s something I can film at one of our sites I’ll try and do some filming on my lunch breaks.”

Manish’s work includes filming, editing and uploading seven Grand Rounds at Sandwell Hospital. He also directed, filmed and edited the iconic NHS 70 film that celebrated the 70th anniversary of the NHS. As well as this he’s recorded the annual meeting of the British Nuclear Medical Society and, produced a well-received film about lung cancer. This film was shown by the Sandwell and West Birmingham Clinical Commissioning Group at meetings across the UK.

When discussing the lung cancer film, in particular, Manish said: “I have the equipment and motivation to make these films. If one person is saved by watching this film then I’ve done my job. The message has to get out there. I will continue to use what I’ve learnt for the betterment of people.” He went on to say, “Film making is all about teamwork. I have been lucky to work with the wonderful people on the cancer services team and I hope to do more work with them in the future.” Manish began film making 12 years ago. Outside of work the films and documentaries he makes have quite the cult following. Focusing on his interests – astronomy and religion, some of his films have accumulated over 1.1 million views on YouTube alone. They have been shown as far away as Brazil and at film festivals in Germany and the United States. He commented that “it has been a steep learning curve to make movies that people will like.”

Earlier this year Manish walked away with the coveted Star Award for Volunteer of the Year. He said that he “wasn’t expecting to get the award” and that it’s made him feel “recharged and invigorated to do more.”

He’s currently working on some nuclear medicine films for posterity and would like to do more filming with other teams around our workplace.