The Royal Children’s Hospital Children’s Bioethics Centre has recently appointed the first Bioethics Clinical Nurse Consultant, Dr Jenny O’Neill. In this Grand Round, we introduce Jenny, and explore the role of the nurse ethicist and the value they can bring to a healthcare service. We will highlight the unique perspective that a nursing background brings to ethical deliberation and clinical ethics consultation.
Over recent years the number of children with advanced heart failure from cardiomyopathy and congenital heart disease receiving treatment has increased considerably. The Royal Children’s Hospital has been the nationally funded centre for heart transplantation in children for 30 years. The RCH heart failure program involves medical, surgical, nursing, allied health and biomedical technology. Successful management of severe heart disease in children requires a detailed understanding of the aetiology, likely disease trajectory and balancing an increasing number of treatment options.
International Women’s Day (IWD) is an annual global campaign, marked on 8th March, which celebrates the social, economic, cultural, and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating women’s equality. Each year the IWD campaign has a new theme, and in 2022 the theme is #BreakTheBias. https://www.internationalwomensday.com/theme
What does great care, everywhere really look like when one in five children begin school with an established or emerging health or development need? One of the best strategies for optimising children’s health is building the capability and capacity of communities to meet their needs locally.
This Grand Round explores the partnership between the Wimmera Southern Mallee By Five project and the Centre for Community Child Health. It examines what it looks like when primary health, education and social care unite to build relational practice, capability and capacity for the sake of a community’s children.
Demyelinating disorders of childhood include a broad range of conditions such as acute disseminated encephalomyelitis, optic neuritis, transverse myelitis, and multiple sclerosis (MS). When children present with a first demyelinating event, parents often ask the question: ‘Does my child have MS’?
Never in the field of health was so much learned by so many in so few months. This Grand Round will recap the lessons from last year, take stock of where we are in February 2022, describe the complex situation with vaccines, and look to what the year might hold for the pandemic and children in Australia and countries around the world.
Understanding and building trust is essential to the RCH Compact and to delivering Great Care, Everywhere.
Research shows trust underpins a good culture, positive relationships between team members and their leaders and with their organisation; and brings out the best in all of us for our patients and their families.
We come to work each day to do the very best for our patients, however in some instances, patients are harmed by the care that was intended to help them. Such clinical incidents affect not only the patients and families, but also the well-intentioned staff. Problems are confounded if information is not provided and there are gaps in learning and improvement. In the busy clinical environment, incidents may be discussed but not thoroughly investigated to understand what happened and why.
Fifteen children aged up to 14 years drowned in Victoria in July 2020 to June 2021. This is an alarming increase on the 10-year average of four child drowning deaths per year. Life Saving Victoria (LSV) is the peak agency in the State for water safety recognised by the Victorian Government. LSV analyses data on fatal and non-fatal drownings each year among people of all ages, to identify prevention and risk-mitigation strategies and inform education programs.
The relevance of regularly measuring blood pressure in childhood and adolescence has been a subject of debate. This Grand Round will present the case for routine blood pressure screening in the young, including data on blood pressure tracking from childhood to adulthood, and the association of high blood pressure in childhood with intermediate markers of cardiovascular disease.
