All entries for Tuesday 26 November 2019

Off to GOSH I go

I’ve decided to make this blog not about transition week, but about the GOSH conference I was lucky to attend. I arrived into Euston at 7:30am from the 4:45am wakeup call and hopped over the road to the Welcome Collection. I have never been more grateful to have the conference so near to the station! I arrived and basically jumped straight into helping. I was invited down to help with the conference, but it was not until I had arrived that I realised exactly what I was doing. They were letting me loose with the official GOSH PGME twitter account. I was a bit in shock, me? I got down to helping lay out the lanyards and said hi to the faces I knew from the team and was re-united with faces who I saw at the Summer School in July.

The day began with some speeches from an ex-patient at GOSH who talked about her condition and how she lives her life outside of just medical treatments. It was such an inspiration to be able to sit and listen to her and she explained how best to support children with the transition from child to adult services. We then had a speech looking at physician health and how we can prevent burn out. The quote that stuck with me here was “we can’t prevent burn out, but we can support it and prevent it getting worse”.I have to fully agree with this quote. We can try our best to keep heads above the water but we will get tired of treading water and will sink. However, it’s about not making the situation worse that it falls into depression. It was such a powerful speech that I nearly missed the beginning of the next one. Professor Dame Jane Darce talked about cracking the glass ceiling in medicine. She began by asking the crowd if we thought we had cracked the glass ceiling. Considering about 50-60% of the people in the room were women, only two people put their hands up. She then asked about if we had made a chip. Nobody put their hands up. Dame Darce then went on to talk about some of the micro-aggressions she had faced throughout her career and I was shocked that attitudes still existed in today’s NHS. She went on to talk about how we need to fix this culture through male allies and by strong role models. She ended by quotingMadeleine Albright — 'There is a special place in hell for women who don't help other women'.

We then had a quick coffee break with the BEST cookies in the world (yes, I know I should be talking about the conference but conference food is amazing). I was given freedom to move about the conference as I pleased so I went to a talk titled how to Harness the power of your learning environment. I considered since I was now in a different learning environment, this would be helpful. She talked about her LOAF and BREAD model and how this incorporates into the main theatre list briefing.At the end everyone in thetheatre introduces themselves, role and what they want to achieve from the day.This allows everyone to be reminded about names, roles and more importantly, competency levels. I could see how this would be incredible for us students as it can be a bit intimidating to ask to cover one area so to be invited to speak up, would be so useful. We then had a presentation by Mr Ross Fisher who talked about how not to do presentations. It was easily one of the best talks I have sat in all year. He talked about the statistics behind long conference talks and uptake of information (1.5% of every 200 facts). He talked about how we need to re-look at our education as PowerPoints serve less of a purpose than they once did. With food for thought, it was lunch time and an opportunity for me to look at the posters presented. I hope to present one day here myself but for now, I’m happy just to look at the posters. I also got to have a go on some simulation software in the form of a computerised dummy which can cry, has a palpable pulse, shows capillary refill time and has a head that turns to sound as well as other features. It was incredible as I’ve never seen something like that before even though it was slightly terrifying to watch.

In the afternoon we had further talks on ethics in caring for the child in hospital, the ins and outs on how they managed to anaesthetise the two conjoined twins over the past year (venous system, arterial system and finally the craniums) and how the GOSH school runs alongside medical treatments. A powerful quote came from the GOSH school speech which was “how can you expect me to become a doctor if I can’t get off the ward into school”. It hit home about not just treating the child but their entire life outside of their condition. We could be treating the next prime minister, the next break through scientists but if we don’t allow them the opportunity to have the chances medically fit children do, they will struggle to achieve their potentials.

I could go on about the GOSH conference for a few more pages but I am aware of the word limit we have on these blogs! The day finished with a final lecture about the DRIVE team at GOSH who are developing new technology for use in healthcare and then a performance from the London International Gospel Choir. They were incredible and such an amazing end to a brilliant day. I am so grateful for the opportunity to help out and I know one day, I will end up at GOSH because they are the type of people I know I want to work with in the future.

Eden Villiers : 26 Nov 2019 08:42 |  Tags: Abbie Mbchb Patients Student Wards Warwick Wms |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem