​Paediatric Infectious Diseases 

The Paediatric Infectious Diseases fellowship programme was initiated by the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health, Aga Khan University in 2006.  This programme aims to provide unique training opportunities in infectious diseases (ID) of children to trainees with specialty training and certification in paediatrics. The long term aim is to prepare a cadre of leading physicians who will provide the evidence-based solutions needed to reduce the burden of childhood infections of major public health importance in Pakistan and other developing countries.​

​Salary and Benefits​​​

Scope after Graduation from the Programme

Independent Infectious Disease Consultant in Pakistan and other countries where the FCPS Infectious Disease is recognised. ​

Administrative Set-up

Department Chair: 

Dr Fyezah Jehan
Professor and Chair, Department of Paediatrics and Child Health

Section Head: 

Dr Fatima Mir
Professor & Section Head 
Paediatric Infectious Diseases
Department of Paediatrics and Child Health

Programme Director:  

Dr. Sonia Qureshi 
Assistant Professor & Director 
Paediatric Infectious Diseases Fellowship Programme
Department of Paediatrics and Child Health

Faculty

Dr. Syed Asad Ali 
Professor 
Chair (Community Health Sciences)
Consultant in Paediatrics Infectious Diseases

Dr. Fyezah Jehan  
Associate Professor & Chair 
Department of Paediatrics and Child Health

Dr. Farah Qamar
Professor 
Department of Paediatrics and Child Health

Dr. Ali Faisal Saleem  
Associate Professor & V Chair
Department of Paediatrics and Child Health​


Programme Officer:
Mr. Shahzaib Salim ​
Associate, Department of Paediatrics & Child Health



On-call Duties and Reporting Time

Reporting time is as per institution 8:00 a.m. -5:00 p.m.

The fellow will do 22 months of clinical service in this two-year fellowship.

The fellow will be required to come in for weekend rounds or stay beyond work hours above in the rare instances of sick patients under primary service or urgent consult sought by other specialties in odd hours.

The fellow will not do in-house calls but will be required to be in telephonic contact for over the phone consultations in the second half of the day when on service. He/she will consult with supervising faculty in the first year before formal feedback to consult seeking teams and to a lesser degree in the second year.


Eligibility

  • MBBS from an institution recognised by the PM&DC, with 55 per cent or above marks in the final examination
  • A year of house job/internship, with six months each in medicine and allied disciplines and surgery and allied disciplines
  • Four years residency training in paediatrics​
  • Successful completion of FCPS Part II in paediatrics​


The selection process is based purely on merit.

Positions Available

Position is available for 2025 induction cycle​​​.​​

Goals & Objectives

At the end of two-year training, fellows should have advanced competence in diagnosis and management of infectious diseases in children, being able to function independently as a paediatric ID specialist.

Year 1:

Clinical

  • ​Assess patients through pertinent history, appropriate physical exam, formulation of a working diagnosis, deciding on care level (inpatient or ambulatory)
  • Manage patients requiring treatment through appropriate investigations and their interpretation, deciding on appropriate antibiotics, requirement of consultations from other disciplines, follow up checks on patients, maintenance of thorough records on patients especially those with institutional mandatory reporting to the ministry of health (TB, especially primary immune deficiency and HIV)
  • Attend all departmental and section academic meetings
  • Encourage official consults whenever possible and leave in a note in the chart even if the problem ends up being non-infectious
  • Train paraprofessionals and juniors on the team
  • Undertake role of infection control officer for paediatrics and child health
  • Take an internal assessment exam monthly

  • Present clinical cases, journal club, literature review on relevant topics on a regular basis in section and department meetings and as per opportunity in cross-city and national meetings​

     
Administrative

  • Maintain a record of all consults on a monthly basis.
  • Register themselves with CPSP as a fellow and diligently fill in activities logbook online in real time
  • Organise and facilitate section academic meetings
  • Attend infectious disease related university wide committee meetings for learning and better understanding (antibiotic sub-committee, vaccination committee, infection control meetings)​
Research

  • Use evidence based medicine and evidence based guidelines appropriately for improved patient care and policy change
  • Conduct clinical research individually by using appropriate research methodology and statistical methods
  • Interpret and use results of various research articles


Year 2:

Clinical

  • All duties of Year 1 with a decreased degree of supervision
  • External rotations in Microbiology, SIUT (transplant infections)  and The Indus Hospital (Karachi Cancer Hospital


Administrative

All duties of Year 1 with a decreased degree of supervision.

Research

Prepare and submit a quality manuscript for publication related to infectious disease.

Duration and Outline of Training​

Duration: 2 years

Outline of Training in First Year:

Year 1 will be an intensive clinical year with infectious disease consultations on inpatients, primary care for infectious disease admissions, ambulatory infectious disease consultations in clinics with 5 different faculty members, academic sessions within the section, microbiology bench exposure time of 3 months (half days). Fellows will be involved in infection control activities related to department of paediatrics on a regular basis and complete one month rotation in the infection control. They will attend committee meetings pertaining to infectious disease in the university; they will be responsible for primary immune deficiency patients, HIV and TB patient care, surveillance and formal reporting to national programmes (PTP, NACP) through AKU. He/she will also participate in clnical audits/case report/ case series manuscript writing.

Academic sessions will include monthly fellow-driven clinico-pathological conference (CPC), clinical case conference , journal club/scan, guideline discussion and difficult cases for conferral.


Outline of Training in Second Year

Year 2 will involve a higher level of independence in diagnosis and management of infectious disease in outpatient and inpatient clinical service. The fellow will also have to demonstrate a greater competence in research methods through designing an original independent research project which should lead to a manuscript for publication. Each graduating fellow must have at least one paper accepted for publication by time of graduation which has been designed and conducted during two years of fellowship. External rotations will include one month each at SIUT (transplant medicine), The Indus Hospital (Karachi cancer hospital, Adult HIV/ID clinics), Adult ID (AKU), ± Shaukat Khanum Hospital (cancer patients) Lahore for an external variety of patient exposure. The fellow will rotate through dermatology and ENT clinics for weeks each for ID specific exposure and a month of rotation in radiology at AKU.



Evaluation and Assessments Process


Following components are mandatory for a successful completion of year and promotion criteria :

  1. ​​Core knowledge.
  • Number of mandatory cores sessions attended (atleast 75% in each year).
  • Attendance in mandatory core sseeions ( atleast 75 % in each year)
  • Monthly MCQs scores (at least 60% in each year)
​​​2. Clinical skills and Decision Making
  • Mini-CEX (minimum of 2 satisfactory scores per year)
  • Quarterly evaluations by faculty (atleast 60% or 3 mean scores in each year)
  • Extra credit will be given on participation of undergraduate/postgraduate and allied health staff teachings and participation in departmental OSCE/ MMI/TOACS
3. Research Activities
  • Atleast 1 participation in clinical audit/ case report/ case series/ review article at the end of year
  • Atleast 1 Original article manuscript submission at the end of training.
  • Atleast attend/participate 1 national/international conference in each year.​

Research

Fellows will have to plan, conduct and prepare manuscript for an original infectious disease related study during these two years. Extra credit will be given for participation in infection control, antibiotic stewardship related projects in the department of paediatrics or university wide.

All Fellowship Programmes