In Focus: LKCMedicine expands Student Assistantship Programme with Paediatric Medicine 

By Retna Devi, Acting Editor, The LKCMedicine

“With concrete tasks and responsibilities [aplenty during our Student Assistantship Programme], participation in clinical activities felt less passive and less protected than before, and that did feel scary at points. All this marked a new beginning — venturing out of the comfort zone of medical student life which, though filled with its own challenges and anxieties, was something that I felt ready to outgrow.”

Dr Zou Tangming’s (Class of 2023) description of the nine-week LKCMedicine Student Assistantship Programme (SAP) offered to Year 5 students aptly sums up how the programme is a sure-fire way to prepare for the impending responsibilities of a House Officer (HO).

SAP is a fixed component in the School’s final-year curriculum that centres around three core specialities: Internal Medicine, Family Medicine, and General or Orthopaedic Surgery. However, as part of the School’s continued efforts to enhance real-world learning experiences, this year’s graduating students were given the option to pick the newly-introduced Paediatric Medicine along with the usual SAP offerings.

A well-received addition, 31 LKCMedicine students were posted to a paediatric inpatient ward at either National University Hospital (NUH) or KK Women’s and Children's Hospital (KKH) for three weeks in February and March 2023.

“I knew for certain that I wanted to do a Paediatric posting during my HO year, hence I signed up for the Paediatric Medicine SAP to gain relevant experience to prepare myself for it. As I had done my medical school Paediatric posting at KKH, I chose to do my SAP at NUH to appreciate the practice of Paediatric Medicine in a different institution and to broaden my perspectives,” explained Dr Ng Chen Lin (Class of 2023), who is presently a HO at KKH’s Paediatrics department.

“It was also a really exciting time because I was among the first batch of students from LKCMedicine given the opportunity to do a Paediatric Medicine SAP posting in NUH!” she added.

While the learning objectives of all the SAPs are mostly similar as they are in line with the Singapore Ministry of Health’s six entrustable professional activities for Postgraduate Year 1 doctors, the Paediatric Medicine SAP offers a unique experience due to the age range of the patients.

KKH Paediatric Medicine SAP Site Co-Lead Dr Jeremy Ho, a consultant general paediatrician, provided some insights into these differences, “We take patients’ histories from the parents instead of the child. There is also the physical examination, which has to be age-appropriate, especially for babies and infants. Although throat and ear examination must be done for all patients, young children hate it! Also, communication skills are very important when dealing with anxious parents.”  

In order to adapt to a paediatric-focused environment, Dr Zou found himself drawing on his communications skills training at LKCMedicine when interacting with the entire spectrum of paediatric patients and their parents. Currently working at KKH’s Department of Paediatrics as a HO, he noted that it helped him feel more equipped and confident to communicate effectively and sensitively, as well as to reflect and adjust his performance and manner with each passing encounter.

Apart from putting the lessons from school to good use during his SAP, Dr Zou appreciated being immersed in the working culture of a paediatrics team. It was a “largely nurturing and cooperative one, amongst juniors, faculty, nurses and other colleagues, and one where teaching and training are valued and consistently implemented.”

Dr Ng attests to this. Some of her favourite moments of the SAP at NUH involve attending weekly HO teachings that included case-based discussions. It also gave her the opportunity to observe the dynamics between senior and junior doctors, and how the former would check in on the welfare and learning progress of junior doctors.

The Paediatric Medicine SAP experience was not solely about hands-on learning and exposure. There were also moments of levity and camaraderie with colleagues. “My other favourite memories include the wide variety of food options in and around NUH that we could consider for lunch, and the mini strawberry jam-on-scones party that we had when our team registrar brought delicious homemade strawberry jam to share!” recalled Dr Ng.

For Dr Zou, one of the highlights was when he got to play with his patients — a daily reminder of the joys of childhood and of caring for children.

The new SAP was a positive experience for both the students and clinicians involved.

Having had the opportunity to observe LKCMedicine students during their Paediatric SAP at KKH, Dr Ho was left impressed by their diligence. “[The students] were great! They were eager to learn, committed to their ward work and wanted to help the HOs as much as possible. I have also recently worked with some of them as new HOs and I am glad to see that they are applying what they have learnt.”

When asked if they would recommend the Paediatrics SAP to their juniors, both Drs Ng and Zou replied with an emphatic yes. Not only was it an eye-opening experience that encouraged an exploration of their strengths and weaknesses, the skills and academic knowledge they gleaned from their SAP have proven to be immensely useful in their current HO posting in paediatrics.