ANZCA Bulletin - June 2009 - Australian and New Zealand College ...

Faculty of Pain MedicineDean’s Report to theAnnual General Meeting 2009This is the tenth year of the Faculty and47 Fellows were granted FoundationFellowship at this ceremony in Adelaidein1999. We are now proud to now number260 fellows, of whom 106 have been grantedFellowship by the examination process.At the Annual General Meeting in May of2008, the Faculty implemented a new Boardstructure, recognising its responsibilitiesnot only to its trainees but also theFellowship and to better provide support forthe progression of strategic initiatives. Fourportfolios were formed, each with a Boardmember as Chair - (Relationships myself theDean, Fellowship Affairs Vice-Dean DavidJones, Trainee Affairs Brendan Moore, andResources, Leigh Atkinson). The Chair ofthese portfolios now makes up theFaculty Executive.We also restructured the committees aswe recognised that Ted Shipton, who hadbeen Chair of the Education and TrainingCommittee, had a massive workload, andTed has continued to provide a fantasticservice to the Fellowship, but now can focuson the Education Committee role. BrendanMoore, has taken over the role of Chair ofthe Training Unit Accreditation Committee,and in the last 12 months, five hospitalshave been re-accredited for training andthe Burwood Hospital Pain ManagementCentre in Christchurch New Zealand, andthe Singapore General Hospital were alsoaccredited. We congratulate Singapore inbeing the first unit outside of Australasiato be accredited by the Faculty for trainingin Pain Medicine. There are currently 23accredited pain training unit throughoutAustralasia and now Singapore.Milton Cohen has worked tirelessly asChair of the Continuing Education andQuality Assurance Committee. The Facultyheld a second Spring Meeting in Septemberat Ayres Rock in association with the AcutePain SIG of ANZCA, the ASA and the NewZealand SA and the Acute Pain SIG of theIASP. I thank Pam Macintyre the Convenor,Stephan Schug, the Scientific Convenorand Steve Jones the Co-Convenor for theirtireless work for what we consider wasan overwhelmingly successful meeting,both financially and politically. A greatdeal of good will and enthusiasm wasgenerated between the acute and chronicpain practitioners, with recognition toimprove outcome for all our patients goodcommunication between the differentspeciality groups is essential. As a followon from that, this year’s Spring Meetingwill be held in Melbourne in October withCarolyn Arnold as Convenor, and onceagain we have had very fruitful input fromJane Trinca and other members of the AcutePain SIG.The Faculty is also very grateful to DrJason Ray for his excellent work as the 2009FPM Convenor in building an exciting andbroad-ranging Refresher Day andScientific Program.Recognising the importance ofcooperation between acute and chronicpain practitioners and the fact that notall pain practitioners can work within amultidisciplinary setting, the Board hasnow reintroduced the process where thosewho practice Pain Medicine, but who maynot meet all the requirements for Fellowshipcan apply for election to the Faculty and bedirected towards Fellowship without furthertraining by completing the case report andexamination requirements. I am hopingthis will allow some of our acute paincolleagues who perhaps do not fulfil all therequirements to apply for fellowship.We continue to receive applications to doour training from outside the five specialtiesthat formed the Faculty originally. Wenow have Fellows who have backgroundsin Obstetrics and Gynaecology, ENT andRadiology, and we currently have threegeneral practitioners undergoing ourtraining programme. This leads us to askthe question, “What is a Pain MedicineSpecialist?” Frank New is chairing aBlueprinting Sub-committee with supportfrom Brian Jolly. This group is spendingmany hours debating this question. Oncethis process is complete then we will needto re-visit our curriculum to see that the twomarry up and ensure that our trainees arecomfortable in their roles after completingthe training process.In October the Board held a workshoplooking at Board Members responsibilitiesand accountability, and this process wasfacilitated by the Australian Institute ofCompany Directors.We are a small Fellowship, but ourFellows are enthusiastic and nationally wenow have three Regional Committees; inQueensland chaired by Paul Gray, in NewSouth Wales chaired by Kok Eng Khor, and,following a meeting in Western Australia inApril, in Western Australia chaired by EricVisser. We are hoping that other states willfollow.In New Zealand, David Jones, TedShipton and Steuart Henderson are workinghard to get Pain Medicine recognisedas a specialty within that country.Internationally our association with theAmerican Academy of Pain Medicinecontinues to grow. Dr Michel Duboisthe Chair of the American Board of PainMedicine Examination Committee observedat our Faculty exam at St Vincent’s inNovember. He was very impressed with theprocess and congratulations go to Dr RayGarrick the Chair of the Exam Committee.Seven Fellows attended the AmericanAcademy of Pain Medicine meeting inHawaii where Roger Goucke was awarded aPresidential commendation and Nik Bogdukreceived a Founders Award for OutstandingContributions to the Science or Practice ofPain Medicine.We continue to try to raise the profileof Pain Medicine both across Australasiaand also in our association with our otherColleges. Leigh Atkinson continues towork tirelessly improving the standingof Pain Medicine both with RACS and inQueensland and Andrew Rice our ASMvisitor will be presenting at the RACSmeeting in Brisbane later this week.Carolyn Arnold and Jane Trinca have beenworking with a group in Victoria looking atavailability of Pain Medicine in that state.Newman Harris and Frank New have formeda group of interested psychiatrists to aim toimprove our standing.The ANZCA Bulletin June 2009 91