Mother and Child Health

 

Introduction

Introduction

The McGill Maternal Child enhanced Skills Program is a six-month clinical residency aimed at providing additional experience to trainees committed to including family medicine obstetrics and newborn care in their practice. The program allows family doctors to enhance their obstetrical skills and knowledge so that they are both confident and competent in the management of family practice obstetrical patients. The program has defined goals and objectives, however, it is flexible and self‐directed in order to provide the trainee with an opportunity to tailor the program to meet their self-identified learning needs and career goals.

One of the challenges that face maternity care providers is the balance between providing maternity care and providing family medicine care. As well, this must be accomplished in the context of balancing their personal life.

General Program Objectives:

The Residency program is designed for family physicians who wish to develop enhanced skills within the complete spectrum of mother and infant health while maintaining and consolidating the competences in general family medicine they acquired during their residency.

The 6-month program is composed of two Obstetrical intrapartum rotations, 1 neonatal intensive care rotation, and three maternal child rotations.

Residents are invited to choose two or three profiles of interest to define the enhanced skills they aim to acquire during their Maternal Child rotations.

The profiles:

1)      Teaching

2)      Physiological birth

3)      Vulnerable clientele

4)      Breastfeeding

5)      Pediatric care

6)      Women’s health

7)      Research

8)      Rural

At the end of the residency program, most residents are competent to act as a resource to other family physicians for mother and child health issues, including, prenatal, breastfeeding, newborn, pediatric and women’s health concerns.

Specific Objectives

Specific Program Objectives

  • Maintain and consolidate competences in high volume mother and child care.
  • Maintain the competency of a polyvalent general family medicine practice.
  • Maintain and deepen competency in the normal neonatal period and the first 5 years of life.
  • Be able to evaluate and counsel on breastfeeding, and perform anterior frenectomy.
  • Maintain and consolidate a deepen obstetrical knowledge and skills. These include physiological birth, instrumental deliveries, perineal repairs, management of high-risk obstetrical situations, and bedside ultrasound to confirm first-trimester pregnancy and basic third-trimester indices. (scholar).
  • Collaborate and communicate effectively and appropriately with patients, colleagues, consultants, nursing, allied health professionals, lactation consultants, and trainees (communicator and collaborator).
  • The learner should learn to balance patient-centered maternity care with the demand of a general family office practice, participate in a call group, and balance family, leisure activities, and work activities (manager).
  • Advocate for family medicine obstetrical care and various models of such care (may include continuous longitudinal care, shared care, or team-based models such as Maison Bleue, SIFFE programs, etc.) (Advocate).
  • Reflect on his/her practice and that of family medicine colleagues using various tools including self-reflection, chart audits, or discussion.
  • Understand the rudiments of research in family medicine obstetrics and either develop or participate in a research project.
  • The learner should show commitment to the patient as well as family medicine maternity care and understand the principles of ethics that play a role in current maternity care (professional).
  • Reflect upon and actualize an individualized learning plan.
     

Specific program objectives by Can MEDS roles have been defined here.

Program Description

Duration

The residency program is six months in duration.

Clinical experiences

1) Variety of clinical settings including hospital birthing centers, outpatient clinics, and community settings.

2) Weekly Continuity of care family medicine clinic.

3) Possibility to have urban rotations, rural rotation, or Indigenous community rotation.

Formal teaching

1) Academic sessions are given by Family physicians, allied health professionals or peers. Given weekly.
2) Participation in Family Medicine Journal Club.
3) Provider training in Neonatal Resuscitation Program (NRP) and in Advances in Labour and Risk Management (ALARM) will be offered if the provider course not completed in the last 2 years. NRP / ALARM instructor course is encouraged.

Scholarly activity

Residents must complete a scholarly activity during their residency program. The project can be a literature review, the development of a protocol, the development of an assessment tool, research, the development of a teaching tool, etc. The Jewish General Hospital Library Services provide research support and Department of Family Medicine masters students (Tannenbaum fellow).

Evaluation process

Faculty Advisor
Each resident will be paired with a staff faculty advisor. Their role will be to meet on a bi-monthly basis, review the residents learning goals, provide an opportunity for reflection,and provide guidance.

 

 

 

Apply/Contact Us

For more information regarding the program:
hannahrachel.shenker [at] mcgill.ca (Dr. Hannah Shenker )
Director Mother and Child Health Program

For more information regarding the application process via the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences:
postgrad.fammed [at] mcgill.ca (Alana Walsh-Ferland )
Postgraduate and Enhanced Skills Coordinator 
(514) 399-9126

Please refer to the following URL for application guidelines pertaining to the Mother and Child health program: https://www.mcgill.ca/pgme/residency-programs/admissions/subspecialty-carms

Inquiries regarding the application process should be directed to admissionspg.med [at] mcgill.ca.

Application deadline for the next academic year is December 15th, 2023.

 

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