Dr Michael Platt graduated as a doctor from the medical school of the University of Western Australia in 1977. After training in pain medicine and anaesthesia in Perth, Australia and London.

He became Senior Lecturer in Anaesthesia at Imperial College and St Mary's Hospital in 1991, and is now Consultant and Honorary Senior Lecturer in Pain Medicine and Anaesthesia at St Mary's Hospital and Imperial College Faculty of Medicine, and is also Honorary Consultant in Palliative care for Kensington and Chelsea Primary Care Trust.

While working in this position, he studied for and was awarded an MA in Bioethics from Surrey University in 2005, with a special interest in end of life issues, particularly in pain medicine. His special interests are nerve pain and functional disability.