Dr Girish Palnitkar grew up in Tasmania, where he completed his medical degree. After a wide variety of junior medical positions in Tasmania and Melbourne, he decided to undertake his anaesthetic specialty training. His final two years of training brought him to Canberra in 2006. After completing his specialist training, he completed an ENT/eye fellowship at the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital in Melbourne. Subsequently, he completed his subspecialty training in cardiothoracic anaesthesia at Royal Papworth Hospital in Cambridge, UK.

He returned back to Canberra in 2010 and now has a busy mixed public and private practice, with an emphasis on cardiothoracics, orthopaedics, ENT and general surgery. However, rather than just sticking to the routine, in 2018 he decided to pursue qualifications in an area of great interest – health economics and policy. In 2020, he was awarded MSc (health economics) from the London School of Economics and MA (public policy) from University of Chicago. Today, he continues a full-time clinical load, but with the aid of insomnia, also works as a freelance health economics/policy consultant.

Girish is currently a member of the ASA’s Economics Advisory Committee (EAC) and previously has been the Chair of the ANZCA ACT Regional Committee. He has also previously been on the executive of the CTVP SIG. He enjoys organising conferences and is currently the convenor of the upcoming 2025 NSC.