Renal Genetics From bedside to bench and back again

Although individually rare, there are many inherited and tubular disorders of the kidney affecting children and adults. This talk will offer a bedside-to-bench-and-back overview of some of the clinical issues facing patients with rare kidney disorders, together with our genetic and cell biological discoveries concerning the C-terminal tails of individual proteins, and why they are so important in ensuring normal renal tubular function.

Leaving the cocoon – Helping young people with intellectual disabilities, autism and associated mental health problems move into the adult world

Synopsis In Australia, over 40% of children with intellectual disability (ID) and/or autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have mental health problems requiring long term psychiatric care. However access to such treatment is inadequate, particularly in adult services. This impacts upon timely transition from the RCH and has the potential to create longer-term negative impacts on the health … Continued

Cognitive computing and disruptive innovation

Advances in cognitive computing are redefining human work. After IBM’s Supercomputer Watson crushed human champions at the quiz show Jeopardy, IBM turned to making Watson the world’s best oncologist. Will the next generation Watson replace clinicians altogether, or will we be protected by our unique combination of cognitive and physical skills?

Improving outcomes in infantile epilepsies

The incidence of epilepsy is highest in infancy. Many infant epilepsies, such as infantile spasms, are very severe, with treatment-resistant seizures and major developmental impairments.
This Grand Round will cover advances in understanding of the causes of infant epilepsies, and how these advances have informed changes in investigation of aetiology and guided use of existing and novel treatments, to improve outcomes in these devastating conditions.

The Victorian Commission for Children and Young People

Ten months into her term as Commissioner of Children and Young People, Liana Buchanan will reflect on the issues affecting children and young people, and discuss some of the Commission’s current projects and priorities.

Domestic and Family Violence: Early intervention in paediatric settings is urgently needed, and the role of health-justice partnerships

This Grand Round explores the role of health professionals in family violence identification and response.
Professor Kelsey Hegarty will discuss how the consequences of family violence are commonly seen in health care settings, and the high intersection of domestic violence and child abuse means that paediatric and women’s health settings have a major role to play in early intervention. Ms Linda Gyorki will talk about how legal problems can have a detrimental impact on health and wellbeing.

The cargo cult of diabetes care: An illustrative dilemma of non-transformative, resource-intensive therapies

Current medical practice is appropriately centred around notions of patient-centred care and personalised medicine. These laudable practices are occurring against a background increasing patient empowerment and disruptive patterns of knowledge transfer. Health care consumers are now interconnected and highly aware of biotechnological advances. Both health care providers and consumers want the latest and “best” in therapies, however all too frequently these therapies are both expensive and non-transformative.

Paediatric patient safety in Switzerland

It was during his fellowship at RCH PICU in the mid-90s, that Bernhard Frey first encountered patient safety initiatives such as critical incident reporting and evidence based medicine. Back home, he tried to implement these concepts in Switzerland and complemented them in the following years by issues such as allocation of care, organizing PICU, technical measures, avoiding overtreatment and the importance of the prevailing culture. In this Grand Round, Bernhard Frey will discuss a practical approach for safe medicine, based on his experience and the current literature.

Traumatic brain injury prediction rules in children: Getting the evidence right, translating into practice, and shared decision making

Blunt head trauma is a common presentation in the pediatric ED. Although some children have overt signs of traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), many have minor head trauma with no or subtle signs of TBI. Among children with apparently minor blunt head trauma, identifying those who indeed have TBI is challenging. Over the past decade there has been increasing use of computed tomography (CT) to avoid missing children with TBI.