Anesthesia at Memorial

The Anesthesia program at Memorial University is best characterized as a small program that considers its sense of community, opportunities for sound clinical experience beginning early in residency and its simulation program as its strongest assets. Resident training is intended to fulfill the career aspirations of the individual resident, whether as an academic pursuing a fellowship or as a community anesthesiologist. There are faculty members throughout the province of Newfoundland and Labrador and the province of New Brunswick, allowing for clinical exposure that encompasses both rural community and tertiary care subspecialty experience. The faculty is very supportive of residency education and maintains a status of full accreditation by the Royal College in its most recent review in 2016.

Memorial provides a five year training program in Anesthesia whose elements are based upon the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Competency By Design (CBD) anesthesia program curriculum.

— Community Building —

Retreat

An annual resident retreat is held in the fall. This is an event centered around wellness; career and team building; financial education and socialization and occurs at interesting venues outside of the working environment

Mentorship program

The mentorship program has been active for many years. It is designed to create long term relationships between resident and staff under an informal framework of professional and personal guidance. There are activities arranged which help to foster stronger ties between residents and their mentors, as well as help build the sense of community which we value so much at Memorial.
The Wellness Committee Chair and the Residency Program Director both agree with the principle that residency should not interrupt life, but become coordinated with and integrated into life. Resident wellness is a priority at Memorial.

Communication

The Anesthesia Message is a newsletter that outlines news about the residency program and about the Discipline in general.

Committee involvement

There are two resident representatives elected by their peers on the Residency Program Training Committee (RPC) and there is a resident representative on each of the RPC subcommittees (research, simulation, etc.), giving them a real voice in how the program is managed.

Social Life

St. John’s, the capital of Newfoundland and Labrador is a vibrant city with a long history and a thriving arts community. We pride ourselves on hospitality and a sense of community for those who “come from away”. Memorial University is one of the largest universities in Atlantic Canada and, as such, has world-class facilities for students both in terms of facilities and programming.

The most important social element of our residency program is our close-knit resident group. A “home away from home”

— Clinical Experience —

The clinical experience has been shaped to fit into the CBD model of residency education: transition to discipline, foundations, core and transition to practice. the accomplishment of the Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs) is facilitated through experiences in general surgery, orthopedic surgery, plastic surgery, urological surgery, cardiovascular surgery, thoracic surgery, neurosurgery, obstetrics and gynecology, pain management (acute and chronic), pediatric anesthesia, regional anesthesia, otolaryngology, ophthalmology, pre-anesthetic assessment clinic, and a community anesthesia experience.

We allow for rich experiences in adult and pediatric critical care as well as anesthesia-related specialties of internal medicine.

Off-service rotations in internal medicine, general surgery and emergency medicine (adult and pediatric) are designed to allow residents to fulfill the pertinent EPAs and the requirements laid out in the Anesthesia Training Experiences (ATE) document published by the Royal College. This will include development of skills in EKG interpretation, bronchoscopy, point-of-care ultrasound, transfusion medicine and medical and surgical emergency assessment and care. Residents will be given opportunities to achieve certification in ACLS, ATLS, PALS and NRP. There are opportunities to schedule electives outside the province.