53 doctors awarded at RCPI Faculty of Paediatrics Admission Ceremony

53 doctors were awarded at a special ceremony held in No. 6 Kildare Street on 3 October, during RCPI Faculty of Paediatrics Autumn Conference.

At the faculty’s annual Admission Ceremony, doctors are awarded Honorary Fellowship of RCPI, Fellowship of RCPI (Paediatrics), Certificate of Satisfactory Completion of Specialist Training, and Associate Membership of RCPI Faculty of Paediatrics.

The college welcomed two esteemed Honorary Fellows – the highest award conferred by RCPI, and reserved for world leaders in medical science and those who have made an exceptional contribution to medicine or healthcare. Each college faculty and institute may admit two Honorary Fellows per year.

Prof David Walker

In 1997, Prof Walker founded the Children’s Brain Tumour Research Centre at University of Nottingham, where a "world first" strategy was designed to accelerate the time to diagnose brain tumours in patients, using a public and professional awareness campaign.

The resulting HeadSmart: Be Brain Tumour Aware campaign, adopted by the NHS, is an evidenced-based clinical guideline that incorporates a decision support tool, together with multiple healthcare informative and educational resources.  Following the introduction of this campaign in the UK, the diagnostic time for children with brain tumours reduced by more than 50% - from 14.4 to 6.7 weeks. 

The campaign continues to be rolled out internationally.

Prof Anthony Costello

During the 1990s, while he was a paediatrician at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust and University College London’s Hospital for Tropical Diseases, Prof Anthony Costello led the development of community engagement and health intervention projects in Nepal, Bangladesh, Malawi, India, Ghana, South Africa and Argentina. Some of these studies showed that mobilisation of women’s community groups led to reduction of newborn mortality by one third.

From 2015-2018, Prof Costello was director of maternal, child and adolescent health at the World Health Organisation in Geneva, leading the global initiatives on quality of care for mothers and children.

The faculty also bestowed a special recognition award to Prof Bee Wee. Originally from Penang, Prof Wee studied medicine in Ireland during the 1980s, becoming the first Senior House Officer in palliative medicine in Ireland. A palliative medicine consultant at Oxford University Hospitals, she was National Clinical Director for Palliative and End of Life Care at NHS England between 2013-2023, providing strategic leadership for palliative and end of life care across England. 

Prof Wee also contributed to Irish paediatric palliative care, through her role as chair of the expert advisory group which was established by the Chief Clinical Officer of the HSE to set out an operational and governance framework for palliative care for children with life limiting conditions in the community.  The final report and recommendations, published in December 2020, is fondly called by some: the Bee Wee report.

Twenty-five doctors were recipients of Fellowship of RCPI (Paediatrics). This is a special recognition of an individual’s contribution to their specialty, as part of a community of physicians operating at the forefront of medicine.

Certificate of Satisfactory Completion of Specialist Training is awarded to Trainees upon satisfactory completion of RCPI’s Higher Specialist Training programmes, and qualifies doctors for entry to the Specialist Division of the Medical Council. Twenty-one Trainees were awarded certificates.

One doctors as recipient of Associate Membership of RCPI Faculty of Paediatrics. This membership category is open to Trainees in Paediatrics, and was established as part of the institute’s strategy to engage with practitioners in paediatrics at all stages of their careers.

The Aspire Fellowships, created in partnership between RCPI and HSE National Doctors Training & Planning to establish a number of world-class Fellowships in Paediatrics, is a 12-month programme for doctors in receipt of a CSCST from an Irish Postgraduate Training Body including RCPI.

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