Hospital Ultimate Guide (HUG)

Prince of Wales

Welcome to the POW HUG! This guide has heaps of super valuable information and advice about how to make the most out of your hospital placements.

Feel free to add in any advice you have to help out your fellow Meddies, both present and future and keep this guide up to date! This can include anything from places to go in the hospital to really improve your skills, ward rounds to join, good Faculty contacts, the best spots for food, drink and parking nearby and more!

Note: Please keep these guides secure and accessible to UNSW Medicine students only. While contributions are anonymous, please be sensitive when discussing Faculty members and refrain from including any confidential information about patients. Information provided is a matter of opinion and does not necessarily reflect the view of UNSW MedSoc.

Table of contents

Essentials        4

Clinical School Admin        4

Student Common Room (a.k.a. Clinical Teaching Unit/CTU)        4

Hospital Map        5

Parking        6

Public Transport        6

Food + Coffee        6

Inside Hospital:        96

Student Common Room:        7

Outside Hospital:        7

How to…        7

Join Ward Rounds        7

Access Medical Records        8

Go to clinics        8

Access operating theatres        9

Attend Grand Rounds        10

Contacts        10

Medicine        10

Surgery        10

Critical Care        11

BGD        12

Ob/Gyn        12

Paeds        13

AH2        15

AH1        16

ACR        17

OPC        18

Haematology        18

RadOnc        18

MedOnc        19

Palliative        19

WELCOME!

This guide has been created to provide some useful information to those of us who are placed at Prince of Wales Hospital during our clinical rotations. Especially for those who are new to the campus, the guide will equip you with the key info you need to get off to a great start.

Essentials  

Clinical School Admin

Your key clinical school admin contact is Jenny Ryall, whose office is in the Edmund Blacket Building next to the student common room (see below for directions). You can reach her by email or in-person during office hours.

Email: jennifer.ryall@health.nsw.gov.au 

For third year students in particular, Justine Perry is also a key contact, and has her office in the same place.

Email: justine.perry@unsw.edu.au

Student Common Room (a.k.a. Clinical Teaching Unit/CTU)

The student common room is located on Level 1, North Wing of Edmund Blacket Building (see Hospital Map below for the pink X).

• Enter the courtyard from Avoca St
• Turn right and enter the North Wing
• Go up the stairs and at the top, turn right. The common room is the big room at the end of the corridor.
• Accessibility: The CTU can alternatively be accessed by the South Wing lift, entering the west offices to access the balcony, using 6 stairs and hoping the balcony doors are open. Email Jenny for further clarification.

Aside from relaxation and breaks, this room is often used for scheduled teaching and tutorials. If there is a tutorial running when you visit the common room, you’re still welcome to quietly let yourself in to use the kitchen/microwave if you need to.

There are also other, smaller rooms along the corridor which can be used for tutorials, study or chilling during your breaks. On the other end of the corridor (i.e. to the left of the stairs) is the library. There is ample space here for quiet study, as well as access to UNSW computers. There are plenty of charging points and comfortable chairs in both the library and the side rooms as well.

Hospital Map

There are two main buildings that make up POWH:

• Parkes Building, on the High St side, and
• Dickinson Building, towards Barker St.

Parkes is the main building (P1-P10) where most of the wards are located. Dickinson is a smaller building with fewer levels (D1-D4). See Contacts section below for specific ward locations.

Parking

All-day parking around POWH can be difficult to find. There are some available in the back streets around Belmore Rd, Barker St, or Coogee Bay Rd (last one requires an uphill walk to hospital). One place that’s a little walk away but is quite reliable is on King St and Dalgar St, though this also requires an uphill walk.

Two and 3 hour parking spots are more readily available in the side streets around Avoca St and High St. This can be really handy for any shorter hospital days. Most of these parking spots are unrestricted outside of 8am-6pm, so if you’re at hospital late (or otherwise outside those hours), parking is much more viable.

Public Transport

Public transport to/from POWH is convenient. The light rail stops right outside the hospital on High St, and connects to Central/Town Hall/Surry Hills. There are also lots of buses from Belmore Rd to key suburbs: Town Hall (373), Bondi Junction (314, 316, 317, 356) etc.

Food + Coffee

There are plenty of good food and coffee places around Randwick, so you’ll have multiple options to choose from. If you’re ever stuck inside the hospital though, there are some cafes inside the hospital complex itself.

Inside Hospital:

Volunteer’s Garden Coffee Shop. Located on Level 1 POWH, along the main corridor between the lift lobby and operating theatres.

Barker St Canteen. Located at the Barker St main entrance.  

Windscreens Cafe. Located near Barker St entrance, towards the Royal Hospital for Women (to the left).

Sunny’s Cafe. Located on Level 0 Sydney Children’s Hospital, near the High St entrance.

These are conveniently located for coffee but the food is more expensive than other options outside the hospital. Still, they can be a lifesaver if you find yourself in a pinch.

Student Common Room:

Common Room Pantry. Located in the student common room, there are some pick-me-ups here if you need an Up&Go, instant noodles or snacks. Please help yourself, but be sure to pay for anything that you use so that we can continue to restock it. The pantry is cashless, so payments are made via bank transfer. All details are present on the pantry door itself.

Outside Hospital:

22 Grams. Located on High St opposite the hospital entrance. Great for coffee and pastries. They have a “Pay It Forward” wall, where people pay for coffees in advance and put a sticky note on the wall. If you take a sticky note and give it to the cashier, you can get a free coffee. If you do this, don’t forget to pay it forward sometime!

Baked by 22 Grams. Located on High St opposite the hospital entrance. They have EXCELLENT croissants and other baked goods,  which are often sold out by lunchtime.

High St Society. Located on High St opposite the hospital entrance. This is the closest to the hospital entrance, so it’s often visited by doctors.

Noodle Inn. Thai food located on Belmore Rd, they do a good lunch deal here.

Soul Burger. Located at The Spot, Randwick. Plant-based, vegan burgers.

Four Frogs Creperie. Located at The Spot, Randwick. Good for a coffee if you’re coming to/from hospital in a different direction. They also make good crepes of course.

Fresh on High. The Vietnamese place on High Street, directly opposite the Bright Alliance building. Pretty good prices and reasonable quality, they have rice paper rolls and buns.

How to…

Join Ward Rounds

Assuming that you don’t know any students who have recently been on the team and can give you insider info, here are the steps to joining ward rounds.

1. Find contact details for the registrar or JMO/RMO on the team (clinical admin should have this). A mobile number is preferable, but otherwise get a pager number.
2. Contact the registrar/JMO/RMO, and introduce yourself as the medical student joining them. Ask when and where to meet them for rounds.
3. When you arrive, introduce yourself and that you are joining their team.
4. Most people will then take the lead and introduce everyone to you + invite you on the round. But if not, ask if you can join the round.

Some tips:

• When you arrive at the ward, it may be hard to tell who’s who. Not sure if you’re talking to the right person? Don’t worry, introduce yourself to anyone friendly-looking and make it clear what team you’re joining, and ask them to point you in the right direction.
• If you can’t find anyone easy to approach, usually one of the nurses at the ward desk will be able to point you to the team or tell you where they’re likely to be.
• If you aren’t introduced to everyone on the team, make sure to introduce yourself again to anyone who doesn’t know you. This generally increases the amount of engagement/teaching you will get on the round.
• If you’re offered a patient list for the round, you can use this to note any interesting patients to follow-up later. It also lists the patient MRNs if you need to access their record at a later date.

Access Medical Records

Medical records at POWH are all electronic. The different programs are accessed via Citrix. On opening Citrix Receiver, a menu will appear with all the relevant programs.

PowerChart (eMR). This is the go-to system while at hospital. PowerChart is where all patient records from the wards and outpatient clinics are kept, including progress notes, pathology/imaging results, medications and BTF tracking. Accessible on all the ward computers and also via several computers in the student common room. You will need your NSW Health Stafflink login details to access it.

• Tip: Every patient has a Medical Record Number (MRN). Remember to note a patient’s MRN if you want or need to follow up on their progress via eMR. In PowerChart, put the MRN into the search bar to bring up the relevant record. You can usually find people by name if you don’t get the MRN, but it requires looking through multiple matches and finding the right person.

FirstNet. Used in the Emergency Department. This contains live information about patients in ED, including their location, triage category, presenting problem, treating doctor etc. It also contains documentation written by ED staff. Double clicking to the left of a patient’s name will open up their linked eMR record.

Go to clinics

Outpatient clinics are mostly located on Level 2, Campus Centre, at either Outpatients A or B.

Clinic schedules are specific to each specialty and subject to change. Your team should tell you about their clinic schedule and you can ask to join. When you arrive, let reception know you’re a medical student joining the clinic and they will direct you to the staff area. There is usually a nurse present who makes sure that the clinic runs smoothly. Introduce yourself to them and they will let you know which doctors are present who you can join.

Access operating theatres

Operating theatres are located on D1, past the Volunteer’s Garden Coffee Shop.

To access OT, first you’ll need to complete the official orientation. This involves online Moodle modules and an in-person orientation. Clinical school admin can help you organise this, so contact them for assistance if needed.

After completing the orientation, you’ll be allowed in operating theatres to observe surgeries. To scrub in, you’ll need to do an additional gowning + gloving session. Again, clinical admin can help you organise this.  

Each time you access the OT, there are a few steps to remember:

1. Sign in at the front reception and they will give you a ‘student’ sticker. Keep this because you need to return it when you sign out.
2. Head to the change rooms and change into scrubs. You can also leave your other items here (in an unobtrusive area) if you need to.
3. Head into the anaesthetic bay of the theatre and introduce yourself to whoever turns your way.
4. Sign out at reception when leaving theatres, and return your ‘student’ sticker as well.

Some tips:

• The front desk staff can sometimes be touchy/protective about letting you sign in, but if you remember these key pointers you should be fine!

• First, make sure to introduce yourself before anything else “Hi I’m ____ and I’m a medical student, I’m here to join _____ (team)”. Make it clear which team you are with and also that they are expecting you/have asked you to come.
• Have your hospital ID with you, as they sometimes ask to see it
• One of the reception staff has a peeve about students walking outside of theatres in scrubs. If you’re going to talk to front reception for whatever reason, make sure that you are not in scrubs.

• Theatres can be a very intimidating place with a lot of staff who are busy. It can be hard to tell who’s who, and who you’re supposed to talk to. The trick is to introduce yourself to anyone who is free or turns to you. Almost everyone is friendly and helpful if they know who you are, and the nurses + anaesthetists tend to look out for you if you’ve introduced yourself. They’re also less likely to yell at you.

Attend Grand Rounds

Grand rounds are open to all staff and students to attend. Each specialty tends to have their own grand rounds as well, which they should let you know about. Feel free to attend them if you are on the rotation - they can be a little niche though.

Contacts

Medicine ward rounds generally start at 8.30am, while surgical rounds start much earlier, around 7am/7.30am. See the table below for specific contacts and information about each team.

• Include the time that each ward round starts and the names of the doctors on each team (this will need to be updated regularly)

BGD

BGD is a mix of ob/gyn and paediatrics which are split into three week blocks within the total 6 weeks. Hospital teaching involves a large amount of in person tutes and lectures in Royal Womens, clinics, ward rounds and some students might be scheduled on for delivery suites.

Below is a run down of this teaching, with explanation of what happens, prerequisite clinical skills and knowledge to make them seem less ominous

Ob/Gyn

Paeds

AH2

AH2 is the term that covers your neuro and ortho placements for the year. However, with the way that POW runs this term, there’s a good chance that you might not get any ortho or neuro placements. Hence, it’s extremely important to hit the neuro wards (P8 and D3E) to practice exams and histories.

This term will also be your surgery assignment. To find a surgery, talk to the students on ortho clinic as see if you can go in for one of the sessions to try and talk to the consultants to see if you can find a surgery to go and see

At POW, for AH2 you have 2x 3 week placements. Placements are as follows:

AH1

AH1 is probably the most chill term at POW because you aren’t assigned to a team and in terms of tutes there’s not many that are too relevant. It’s important to go to the weekly case discussions as they’re good to consolidate knowledge and get a good depth of information.Hence, this term is definitely the one to be the most self-directed so that you can get the most out of this term.

When you go to wards, try to take a history and exam a patient and then think up differentials and investigations. By checking your ideas with the EMR will help you develop your clinical reasoning. AH1 is the term most relevant for your ICE clinical exams. Hence the table below will be broken down into common symptoms, differentials and investigations you should try to experience in this term

ACR

ACR is a 4 week term and is the one where you get assigned to the same team for 4 weeks so the doctors actually get to know you and see some consistency.

This is also a great term to practice your exams as a lot of the geriatric patients have multiple pre-existing conditions that you can exam for if you have time. The teams include  

OPC

OPC at POW consists of three weeks of oncology where you rotate between Haematology, Radio-oncology and medico-oncology. The last week is palliative teaching.

This is the term where you will probably feel the most supported as the convenor Melvin is absolutely lovely and takes the time to get to actually know you and tries to remember everyone. There’s also plenty of clinics that you can attend each week for the different rotations.

For the the different disciplines, there are multiple doctors who you can join for each. Below is a rundown of each doctor available for each discipline and what their oncological focus is.

Haematology

RadOnc

MedOnc

Palliative

SH

Here’s a link to the feedback and opinions on different SH placements for you to make your decisions

SH Placement Feedback Form 

For any questions or clarifications please contact: 

Sujit Krishnan (Year 3 Representative)

Jason Djafar and Angela Xue (Year 5 Representative)

Leon Wang (Year 6 Representative)