CICM Training at the RAH
The Royal Adelaide Hospital ICU is the busiest Level 3 Unit in South Australia, admitting 1500 Intensive Care and 1900 High Dependency admissions per year to its 34 beds. It is a busy, mixed medical/surgical adult quaternary ICU resulting in the exposure of its staff to a broad and varied casemix of patients.
The Unit is staffed by residents and registrars of differing levels of experience and background, with a mixture of trainees registered with College of Intensive Care Medicine (CICM) and those rotating from other training programs, completing a general hospital year, or overseas graduates wishing to obtain ICU experience. (link to Registrar Positions).
We provide a comprehensive training experience for CICM trainees:
- broad and varied casemix of medical and surgical patients in a busy general ICU
- extensive consultant experience, oversight and bedside teaching
- formal weekly training program (including clinical audit, journal club, registrar teaching, radiology meeting, simulation) - LINK
- BICMED Course - LINK
- CICM Fellowship Examination preparation (written questions, hot cases, vivas)
- involvement in a number of other courses (see below)
BICMED Course
- An introductory course for junior and general trainees rostered to the RAH ICU for 3-6 month rotations. It runs over a 12 week cycle, repeating 4 times per year, on Friday afternoons from 15:00-17:00.
RAH Primary Short Course
- Run 1-2 times per year over 5 days, coordinated by Dr Mark Finnis.
Fellowship Examination Course
- Run annually over 3 days in February, and coordinated by Dr Nick Edwards.
South Australian Critical Care Ultrasound Course
- Run annually over 2 days in April, and coordinated by Dr Michael Farquharson with assistance from Dr Richard Strickland and others.
BASIC
- A 2-day interactive course developed by Charles Gomersall and the University of Hong Kong which aims to teach 'basic' ICU concepts and is run at a number of sites in South Australia. Several of our ICU Consultants are instructors, with 2 courses a year run at the Royal Adelaide Hospital.
EMST / ATLS (RACS)
- 2 Provider Courses are held at the RAH each year, and 1 Refresher Course every second year. Dr Alex Wurm (2011-current) is on the National EMST Coordinating Committee, having replaced Dr Nick Edwards (2002-2011) in that role.
Fellowship Examination Preparation
- CICM trainees preparing for the Fellowship Examination have access to substantial teaching and practice. Regular formal sessions are as below, with further teaching as required.
- Hot cases - every Wednesday afternoon from 3-5pm.
- Written questions – every Thursday afternoon from 3-5pm.
- Viva practice – Thursday afternoon from 3-5pm between sittings of the Written Component of the CICM Fellowship Exam and the Clinical Component.
- The pass rate for Royal Adelaide Hospital CICM trainees at the Fellowship Exam over the past 12 years is over 90%.
The overall pass rate over that period is 58%.
Research
Trainees are actively encouraged to participate in research on the Unit, both in terms of personal research and larger trials.
Significant support is also available for CICM trainees for their Formal Project requirements, and they are encouraged to present and publish their results.
The Tub Worthley Travelling Scholarship Dinner is run annually with the support of Pfizer, and provides trainees with an excellent opportunity to present their research to Intensive Care colleagues from across the State, and compete for the Scholarship.
Trainees are also encouraged to present their research at the annual Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society (ANZICS) ASM and the CICM ASM.
We have had a number of winners of the Matt Spence Medal for the best registrar research presentation at the ANZICS ASM. |
