Teaching Award honours Hospice Specialist
Hospice palliative medicine specialist Dr Bruce Foggo has been announced as a recipient of this year's Dennis Pickup Clinical Teaching Award.
One of only two awards granted annually, the award is recognition for clinical teachers who are judged by staff and students to have made an outstanding contribution to academic medicine by virtue of their qualities as role models and their contribution to the relationship between the health profession and the faculty of Medical & Health Sciences at the University of Auckland.
As the Mercy Hospice Auckland Medical Team Leader, Bruce Foggo and six medical colleagues are an integral part of the multi-disciplinary team that delivers its unique caring services.
Bruce's medical career began in Auckland and coincidentally his first House Surgeon rotation was at the then Mater Hospital, later renamed Mercy Hospital. Bruce's interest in palliative care developed during his 20 years as a GP in Tauranga where there was community hospice.
This interest was fostered with three months practical experience in an Adelaide hospice and formalised distance learning resulting in a Master of Palliative Care qualification.
Bruce is an Honorary Senior Lecturer at the School of Medicine, and it is for his skills and effectiveness in this role, along with his many other contributions to the speciality, that staff and students nominated him for the Dennis Pickup Award.
The award carries a grant of $2,000 which may be used for teaching or research; this has yet to be decided by Bruce. But with the aging population and new breadth of illnesses there is no shortage of projects to interest 'our' winner.