Academic Program at Monash Newborn
The Department maintains a very active academic program which is designed to meet the needs of Australian trainees and of International Medical Graduates who come to Monash Newborn to advance their neonatal training. Australian graduates training under the auspices of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians may come to the Department as basic paediatric trainees undertaking their first neonatal position, or as advanced trainees following a paediatric or neonatal/perinatal career path. The Department’s accreditation with the Neonatal/Perinatal Specialist Advisory Committee of the Royal College has recently been renewed with re-approval to provide the full amount (2yrs) of accredited training of which a maximum of 18 months can be core trainingKey components of the academic program include a 3 day orientation program for new staff, a core lecture program that covers all major neonatal topics, regular Grand Round presentations by Registrars and Fellows, joint perinatal meetings and clinical audit and research meetings. Fellows also attend the monthly full-day teaching programme of the Melbourne Neonatal Fellowship. This programme is provided as a joint initiative of the 4 Melbourne NICUs with each NICU hosting the monthly program on a rotating basis.
All Registrars and Fellows attend a full-day resuscitation training programme based on the NRP training as part of the Monash Newborn orientation programme and receive graded supervised ‘hands-on’ experience until credentialed as skilled in basic and advanced resuscitation. Monash Newborn also provides all its medical staff with the opportunity to attend a half day neonatal session at Southern Health’s state of the art Simulation Centre which provides team and communication skills training in the context of neonatal resuscitation.
The local program at Monash benefits greatly from the wide range of paediatric sub-specialists who contribute to the lectures and from the generous support of the Centre for Clinical Effectiveness whose staff provide educational sessions designed to promote critical appraisal of evidence by the nursery staff.
Nursery medical staff are also encouraged to attend, where possible, the academic meetings of the Paediatric Department and where relevant, parts of the Post Graduate Academic Program of Southern Health.
In addition to the scheduled teaching program the Department provides structured and individualised support to address the training needs of each of its Registrars and Fellows. Each junior doctor is assigned a member of the senior medical staff team as their personal supervisor who takes responsibility for working with the Registrar or Fellow to identify their training goals, monitor progress, and provide their trainees with regular feedback and guidance through a documented performance appraisal process.
Sessions