Associate Professor Carole Smith gained her medical degree from the University of Melbourne before training further as a clinical and laboratory haematologist at the Austin Hospital. She spent many years there, including 10 years as the Medical Director of Austin Pathology. Associate Professor Smith gained her doctorate studying malignant haematology and mechanisms of chemotherapy. She learnt bone marrow transplantation at Royal Marsden Hospital in the UK, and returned to set up apheresis and autologous bone marrow transplantation at the Austin Hospital. Associate Professor Smith speaks regularly at international meetings and is a founding member of the Serious Transfusion Incidence Reporting committee for Haemovigilance and Transfusion Adverse Event Reporting in Victoria.