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IntroductionThis section contains elective reports from Australia. Use the menu above to select a particular hospital/region. General Information
 Here are some links that you may find useful: MelbourneRoyal Melbourne Children's Hospital (Article taken from Oxford University Medical School Gazette)
Destination contact(email): >antonietta.anello@rch.org.au Destination website: The Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne Arriving It wasn't the 25o sun illuminating the clear blue sky first thing in the morning. Or the hill-free walk here lasting under 5 minutes. And it certainly wasn't anything to do with the McDonalds right there at the entrance. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something wasn’t quite right about the start of this new attachment. Walking past the lifts on my way to the stairs, I half-heartedly pressed the ‘lift-call’ button. Unexpectedly, a lift actually arrived. A little perplexed I stepped in, and made my way to the 4th floor. A surprisingly quick introduction and ID card photo-shoot later, I was already on a ward attempting to locate the team I was to be attached to. With no staff free, I thought I would seek the assistance of the friendly looking middle-aged man stood by my side at the ward reception desk. Assuming him to be one of the parents from his classic fathers’ holiday clothing triad of knee-length khaki shorts, white socks and sandals, I enquired if he by any chance knew of the whereabouts of my supervising consultant. "Ah yes - are you one of the new students starting today?" Impressed by his insightfulness, I confirmed that I was indeed. "Well welcome to the team! I'm Dr Lubitz. Let me show you around!" Still a little perplexed and now feeling a tad overdressed too, I followed, whilst discretely attempting to take off my tie. No. I still couldn’t work out why this attachment seemed a little different... The hospital Admittedly, the entire journey to my Paediatrics placement did take slightly longer than 5 minutes. Over 1200 minutes more in fact. Via a quick stopover in Singapore, Melbourne was where I went on to spend a truly amazing month. Fortunate enough to go in January, the southern hemisphere summertime, the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) was where I managed to exchange constant rain back home, for constant sun. There was still, however, a surprising amount of rain, but the saying "if you don’t like the weather in Melbourne just wait 5 minutes" certainly held true. With 311 beds and over 280,000 children treated every year, the RCH is a major tertiary referral centre, not only for children from throughout Australia, but also for specialist cases from a number of Asia-Pacific rim countries. A leading centre in cardiac and bone marrow transplantation, the RCH is also home to the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, the largest research body in Australia specialising in child and adolescent health. Over the course of the month, I spent half my time with a general medical firm, and the other half in the busy emergency department. Being the summer holidays for the local students I had free run of the hospital and could attend as many outpatient clinics as I liked, with not a single sign-up sheet in sight. With the help of some friendly doctors who were always happy to teach, clinics and ward rounds proved to be an excellent opportunity to see a huge range of cases, from the common asthma and eczema, to the slightly less common Maroteaux-Lamy and Alagille's syndromes. When not being excited by the sight of a helicopter landing on the helipad just outside, the emergency department provided valuable experience in taking histories from and examining some of the 58,000 acutely ill children that present each year. Just watching some of the experienced consultants efficiently examine and treat screaming infants in a mere fraction of the time that it took me (and all without the aid of a toy platypus) not only helped improve my examination skills, but also highlighted some of the unique skills needed to succeed in this fascinating specialty. It did, also, reinforce a common misconception: children are not always cute, certainly not when ill. With the help of a clever computerised text-message based paging system, online clinical guidelines available throughout the hospital, and a batch of new SHOs who were very keen to teach in order to revise their medical school Paediatrics, I was able to rapidly learn the management of a number of Paediatric emergencies. "How ya going?" One advantage of an attachment in an English speaking country is the obvious lack of any communication barriers. Or so I thought. On several distinct occasions I heard doctors tell parents to “bring him back if he’s crook”. Impressed by the truly holistic attitude of the Australian medical system, it helped explain Melbourne's low crime rate. Doctors even took in the kids that had gone a little astray in life and gently tried to ease them back onto the right path. I discovered a few days later that to be “crook” meant to be ill, and had nothing to do with criminal tendencies. Before long, though, I had picked up a few key phrases and could confidently spot a sheila from a galah, without mistaking either for a jillaroo. Bonza. Stepping outside the hospital... Home to the Australian Open tennis championships, athletics at the Olympic Park Stadium, Australia's largest cricket ground, a grand prix circuit and several Australian Football League stadiums, there’s certainly no shortage of sport in Melbourne, Australia’s second largest city. Throw in all the usual big city attractions, add a few extras, from the music festival on the sands of St Kilda to the moonlight cinema in the Botanical Gardens, and yet there is still just so much more to do in Melbourne. Sydney may well be the tourist capital, but Melbourne is definitely the place to live.
 It is impossible to visit about Melbourne without paying homage to perhaps its most famous address. Moonlighting as the Neighbours set from time to time, Ramsey Street is actually Pin Oak Court, just a regular quiet cul-de-sac in the suburbs of Melbourne. Australians just don’t seem to understand the wave of tourists brandishing cameras and screaming “Karl!” Despite being someone who only dabbles in watching the show, I found myself being strangely drawn into the experience, even sending group emails to friends from the address karl.kennedy@hotmail.com. SydneyWestmead Hospital, Sydney
Destination contact(email): >None available Destination website: None available The hospital Westmead Hospital, Sydney, is one of the largest hospitals in New South Wales, and is also world-renowned for its transplantation programme. The director of the programme (and my supervisor) is Professor Jeremy Chapman, an expatriate Brit. His team consists of 2 surgeons, 4 nephrologists, 2 transplant physicians, and approximately 10-15 allied health professionals and trainees. Westmead has set a number of benchmarks, being the first centre in Australia to perform a simultaneous kidney-pancreas transplant (now being done routinely by the team). What I did... About half my time was spent in the clinical setting: watching transplants, attending departmental seminars, ward work, as well as taking part in transplant and nephrology clinics, where I found my time best spent. This was because I was encouraged to undertake the consultation personally, with the supervising doctor either watching, or being presented to afterwards, before seeing the patient himself. The other half of my time was spent attached to the adjacent Centre for Kidney Research, undertaking a meta-analysis with the Cochrane Renal Group, of renal transplantation drug trials since 2000. The data analysis is still ongoing, but ultimately will highlight the inconsistent methodology used in assessing immunosuppressant efficacy post-transplant. Both teams made me feel very welcome, encouraging me to offer opinions & suggest plans for problems encountered. I gained a lot of confidence during my time here, both in dealing with common post-transplant complications (both early and late), and in managing data collection, analysis, & storage from nearly 200 journal articles. Outside the hospital In my time away from the hospital, I was able to visit the Blue Mountains (approximately a 2 hour train journey from central Sydney), as well as attending 'surf school' in north New South Wales - a highly enjoyable (if very tiring and painful!) weekend. I was able to visit all the sights of Sydney, including the Opera House (the bar of which became a regular meeting point with other Oxfordians, with its view across the harbour to the famous bridge), Manly & Bondi Beaches, and the Royal Botanical Gardens. I became a supporter of the Sydney Kings basketball team (watching them play live at least four times), & I was able to attend both the Chinese New Year celebrations (the largest outside of China) and the Sydney Mardi Gras. Thus it was with great sadness that I left the cosmopolitan life of Sydney behind, and travelled the 5000km (and 21 hours back in time, due to the date line) to the sedentary lifestyle of the Cook Islands. |
