Assessment - Child and Adolescent Health course

Page content : 1. Overview | 2. Hurdles and requirements | 3. Special circumstances | 4. Prizes

Overview

The mark in the Child and Adolescent Health course will be combined with the mark in Women’s Health to give a combined mark for the subject Women’s and Children’s Health. Overall, approximately 25% of the assessment in Child and Adolescent Health course will come from Paediatric Surgery and 75% from Medicine (this encompasses general, developmental and specialty child and adolescent physical and mental health). In addition to numerical assessment, there are a number of hurdle requirements. Satisfactory completion of these is required to pass Women’s and Children’s Health (see below).

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Hurdles and requirements

1. Satisfactory morning case based learning
   During your CAH term you are required to present an acute case to the student group (approximately 15 minutes plus question time). The presentation will be assessed by a tutor who will ask questions of you and of the group. This presentation will be marked according to the quality of the history and examination findings, in addition to the discussion of the differential diagnosis, management steps and the style of communication. You will receive feedback on your performance after your presentation. Students not completing this satisfactorily will be required to do a further presentation.
2. Satisfactory completion of one paediatric elective topic
   In week one you are required to select an elective topic from the list of over 55 general and subspecialty paediatric areas. This is an opportunity to spend a minimum of 4 and maximum of 10 hours studying this area further under supervision. Students are required to present their work at a department meeting or in written format to their supervisor’s satisfaction. In addition, in week 8, ten students will be chosen to present their work to the larger
   student group.
3. Maternal and Child Health Nurse (MCHN) visit
   You are required to spend half a day with a MCHN in the community. Students at Sunshine Hospital and Northern Hospitals will have visits arranged from these sites. During the first week, all other students are required to arrange their own visits. You will be asked to provide your preferences for which areas of Melbourne you wish your MCH Nurse visit to be. You will then be assigned a nurse to contact so that only one student visits any one nurse per term.
4. Completion of ward and triage nurse shadowing
   During your CAH term you will be required to shadow a ward nurse and perform specified tasks such as taking a child’s vital signs, administering medication with a spacer and changing an infant’s nappy. During your two weeks in Emergency you will be allocated to a time with the triage nurse to perform specific tasks.

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Special circumstances

If you find that you are having difficulty completing the course requirements, or face health or other personal issues that significantly affect your ability to study or sit examinations please discuss your situation with the course coordinator and/or your PBL tutor as soon as possible. Seeking help early often prevents you experiencing additional anxiety or distress. The University has a formal special consideration process which must be completed within 3 days of the final examination in this subject.

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Prizes

A number of prizes are available to students in the Child and Adolescent Health course. The following prizes are awarded according to merit in clinical Paediatrics:

• Clara Myers Prize in Paediatric Surgery
• Howard Williams Prize
• Vernon Collins Prize

Please see: www.unimelb.edu.au/unisec/awards/medindex.html for the guidelines of these prizes.

A further prize is available, the Paediatric Handbook Prize. This award(s) will be made based upon a written case discussion (maximum 1500 words). The selection panel will be composed of members or designates of the Department of Paediatrics (as appointed by the Stevenson Professor of Paediatrics). The case discussion should focus on the interaction between organic illness and child and adolescent behaviour, development and mental health (i.e. psychosomatic illness). Candidates should draw on their own clinical encounters in Paediatrics and selected literature to produce a commentary of an illustrative case. Case discussions must be submitted once a year (at end of Semester 11) at a date announced by the course coordinator (usually in June).

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