AMD eBulletin – June 2025
A message from your President
Hello and kia ora
As I step into the privilege of being AMD President, I’d like to take a moment to emphasise that just as the College is here to represent its members, AMD Council and our Executive Committee is a forum for supporting and advancing our Division, and for ensuring that your voices are heard within the College. Please contact us at any time if you want to raise issues. Colleges are not about buildings or events, but about the people that are part of them, and we need to work together as much as possible.
I’d like to warmly welcome our new members to AMD Council, including our new President-elect, Dr Anthony Deacon, and I look forward to us working together.
I recently attended the College’s Convocation Ceremony, which took place in Sydney on the Saturday, 31 May. The Ceremony continues to be one of the key traditions and celebrations of our College and it was a great pleasure to witness new Fellows commemorating their achievements alongside their friends and family. It is always wonderful to have families there as they are absolutely part of the hard work and sacrifice you have made to get to this stage of your career. Congratulations to you all on this remarkable accomplishment.
There is currently a wide range of College awards and prizes open to AMD and Chapter members, as well as opportunities to meet your colleagues at upcoming events. I know that these opportunities can get lost in the noise at times – so I encourage you to have a skim over the relevant sections below and share with your colleagues.
Finally, I would like to express my gratitude and appreciation to my friend and colleague Professor Graeme Maguire for all his hard work over the past three years as AMD President. We have spent several years together on AMD Council and Executive, taking a long time to meet in person due to restrictions during the COVID pandemic. He has had a very open leadership style during his tenure and will be sorely missed. I have asked him to share some reflections on his 2022-2025 term:
How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard
I have always valued this quote by A.A. Milne and his ursine protagonist, Winnie the Pooh. Handing over to Brian as our new AMD president is both hard and easy, bitter and sweet. Leaving AMD Council reflects the bittersweet nature of farewell and departure and the respect and regard with which I hold him, my fellow AMD Council members and the College staff who have supported us. It is also easy as I know our Division remains in good hands both with Brian as President, new President-elect Anthony, all our committed elected and specialty society representatives, and the College staff who work tirelessly, and often largely anonymously, getting things done.
Throughout my term as your outgoing AMD President, I have consistently felt there is tangible personal and professional value in the volunteering and pro-bono work many of us undertake for our College. The opportunity to belong and contribute is both a privilege and one which supports what is key to our profession, our community of practice. Without this we risk becoming, or being perceived as, a group whose only interest is self-interest.
With my colleagues in AMD Council, we have consistently advocated for the needs of our members and patients including those in regional, rural and remote communities, we have promoted stronger relationships with the specialties and Chapters, and we have built better links with our trainees in a recent update to AMD Council’s membership. At the AMD Council meeting on 2 April, we discussed member wellbeing and workforce advocacy, both of which remain ongoing priorities for the AMD Council.
In recent years we have also launched an annual AMD Leadership Workshop program. I’m excited to announce that the 2025 AMD Leadership Workshop is set to take place in Te Whanganui-a-Tara | Wellington on 15 and 16 November, reinforcing our commitment as a bi-national College and further enhancing the leadership and management skills of our AMD members. Registration details will be launched soon.
As AMD adapts to the recent changes to the College Council, we also remain committed to continuing our support for our Division, including its Chapters and specialties, and are proud to serve as a unified voice for our members. It has been an honour to serve for the past eight years as a member of AMD Council and I encourage you all to consider opportunities to get involved with our College.
Graeme Maguire
As always, if you have any topics that you would like to raise with AMD Council, or that you would like to be included in a future eBulletin, please reach out via adult.med@racp.edu.au.
Professor Brian Wood
President, Adult Medicine Division
AChSHM President’s Post
Hello and kia ora,
Welcome to the new Fellows across the Chapter – I had the pleasure of meeting some of our new Fellows at the Sydney Convocation Ceremony. This was one of my first official acts as your new AChSHM President, and I was honoured to celebrate these achievements in person with our new Fellows.
I would like to express my gratitude to Dr Massimo Giola for all his hard work over the past three years as AChSHM President (2022–2025). Massimo’s contributions to our Chapter during his time in leadership, in addition to his own work consulting in various capacities, have helped focus sexual health medicine initiatives in Australia and drawn attention to issues arising in Aotearoa New Zealand.
The past few months have been busy for the Chapter and the AChSHM Committee. Massimo has shared some words and reflections about his term as Chapter President:
I am very proud of the work we have achieved during my term as AChSHM President. Key highlights include the renewal of the training curriculum, and the work we have done to plan for the future of the specialty. Although there are always larger specialties that overlap with the work we do, our role as sexual health physicians is to take a broad, elevated view of our patients’ health across all areas. Compared to my time as a trainee, our specialty now sits much closer to the WHO definition of sexual health; including transgender care, sexual health in later life, menopause, sexual assault services, and more.
As a Committee, we have made significant strides in our work to improve awareness of HIV clinical indicators, and I would like to particularly commend Louise for her engagement with and advocacy for this important topic. We have also been observing some of the recent distressing changes to gender affirming care in some jurisdictions, and we remain committed to strongly advocating for the needs of our patients. We are in ongoing conversations with the College about how best to support existing advocacy efforts, and for those who have not yet seen it, I would like to highlight the recent letter from the RACP President and the PCHD President to the Queensland Minister for Health and Ambulance Services which emphasised the importance of providing ongoing gender care services for youth patients.
Recently, we updated our AChSHM Committee By-law to better ensure representation of members in Aotearoa New Zealand including the addition of a dedicated position for a representative from the New Zealand Sexual Health Society (NZSHS). Although several of our current Committee members are also NZSHS members, this change ensures Aotearoa members know that their voices will always be represented on the Committee. In early 2025, we also changed the way some of our Chapter Awards will be presented; going forward we will present our trainee awards at the annual AChSHM Annual Scientific Meeting (ASM). This change came into place at the recent 2025 AChSHM ASM, which took place on 15 March in person at the RACP Sydney offices. The attendance for this event was encouraging, with 61 delegates and 12 speakers, and it was fantastic to have the chance to see so many of you in person. The Annual Training Meeting (ATM) was also held in person this year, with 22 trainees attending on 14 March. Planning is underway for our 2026 ASM and ATM, which will be held as virtual events in mid-late March.
There were four AChSHM Committee positions open for nomination at the 2025 College elections. These were confirmed at the College’s Annual General Meeting on 30 May 2025.
I am pleased to announce the following elected positions:
- Committee Member: Dr Yen Li Lim
- Trainee Representative: Dr Ethan MacMinn
- Policy & Advocacy Lead: Dr Timothy Bromley
I congratulate Dr Lim and Dr MacMinn who, after filling casual vacancies in 2024, will continue working with the AChSHM Committee for three-year terms. I also congratulate Dr Bromley on his successful election, and I look forward to hearing future updates on the Committee’s work.
There were some roles that did not receive any nominations at the 2025 elections. Expressions of Interest for the President-elect and a Fellow representative position can be found on the RACP website. I strongly encourage you to nominate yourself or a colleague and share with your networks to ensure that Louise and the AChSHM Committee can continue with our important work into 2025 and beyond.
The next AChSHM Committee meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, 30 July via Zoom. If there are any items you would like to raise with the Committee, or if you have any feedback for us, please feel free to contact us through our secretariat at shmed@racp.edu.au.
Clinical Professor Louise Owen
President, Australasian Chapter of Sexual Health Medicine
AChPM President’s Post
Hello and kia ora.
As your new Chapter President, I look forward to representing each of you and I know that the Chapter Committee will continue to do fantastic work on our key initiatives. Our annual Spirituality Workshop is being planned for later this year, to be held in November – more details to be shared soon.
I would like to welcome our newly elected Committee members, Dr Ben Gunawan and Dr Chi Li, and I would like to highlight the current open EOIs for new members of the Committee:
- AChPM President-elect
- AChPM Trainee Representative.
I strongly encourage you to nominate yourself or a colleague and share with your networks to ensure that we can continue with our important work into 2025 and beyond.
I would like to warmly thank Associate Professor Peter Poon for his contributions as our AChPM President (2022–2025). Peter has shared some reflections on his term as President:
Over the past 3 years, the AChPM Committee and I have continued to progress our key work plan initiatives and advocate on behalf of our members. The Committee’s priorities have included the ongoing work on a youth appropriate healthcare statement, advocacy on telehealth items, building a strong relationship with the TGA to address issues such as ongoing medication shortages, ongoing development of the spirituality training workshops, and the review of the curriculum.
We have consistently advocated for palliative medicine issues, including improving access to multidisciplinary palliative care in residential aged care facilities, and for better service provision in remote and rural areas for our patients. I’d like to express my sincere thanks to my colleagues for your support and dedication over the past few years; and I am excited to see this important work continue under Gauri’s leadership.
The next AChPM Committee meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, 6 August 2025, to be held virtually. If you have any feedback, questions, or concerns for the Committee, please feel free to reach out through the Chapter secretariat at PallMed@racp.edu.au.
Dr Gauri Gogna
President, Australasian Chapter of Palliative Medicine
Hello and kia ora,
I would like to recognise the substantial contribution of Professor Adrian Dunlop during his term as President of the AChAM. Adrian’s tireless work to ensure representation from all Australian jurisdictions and Aotearoa New Zealand has resulted in the addition of new jurisdiction positions in the recently approved AChAM Committee By-law. I would also like to express my appreciation for the extremely professional and respectful way Adrian chaired the meetings of the AChAM Committee, which I hope I in turn will emulate. He has also been instrumental in the planning for the upcoming International Medicine in Addition (IMiA) conference, more details on this below.
Adrian has shared some reflections about his term as AChAM President:
I’d like to thank the AChAM Committee for its valuable contributions over the past three years. While there is still work to be done, we’ve made great progress, such as with the publication of the RACP Position Statement “Achieving a health-focused approach to drug policy in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand” last November, and our successful collaboration with the RANZCP on the joint “Prevention and treatment of gambling-related harm” position statement released in August last year. I would also like to extend my thanks to all Chapter members who have contributed to these important pieces of work and broader policy and advocacy priorities over the past three years. Our Committee has also tirelessly supported our members in all jurisdictions; no mean feat given the vast differences between regulatory frameworks and health systems. I’d also like to warmly welcome John to the role of AChAM President. It has been a pleasure working closely with him on the Committee and I look forward to seeing him make the role his own.
IMiA 2025 Conference
The International Medicine in Addiction (IMiA) 2025 Conference will take place on from 29 to 31 August, 2025 at the International Convention Centre in Sydney – see the conference website for more information: Registration & Accommodation | IMiA. AChAM and RACP are the lead convenors of this conference for 2025, and I encourage you all to register for your place now at what will be an excellent two-and-a-half-day event, featuring international keynote speakers Dr Lorenzo Leggio and Dr Kathleen Page, as well as the RACP Caughey Lecture, and multiple symposia, workshops, and case discussions. There will also be a Trainee Day prior to IMiA on 28 August, planned by Dr Douglas Brown and Dr Kate Senior, who will be reaching out to AChAM trainees with further details.
AChAM Committee updates
There were three AChAM Committee positions open for nominations at the 2025 College elections. The provisional results were published on 6 May 2025, and confirmed at the Annual General Meeting on Friday, 30 May 2025.
I am pleased to announce the following elected positions:
- President-elect: Dr Jonathan Brett
- Aotearoa New Zealand Lead Convenor: Dr Vicki Macfarlane
- Trainee Representative: Dr Douglas Brown
Expressions of interest are currently open for three new Regional Lead Convenor positions which have been added to the AChAM Committee By-law. We invite members from ACT, SA and TAS to consider submitting an EOI for the new positions.
The next Committee meeting is planned to be held on Wednesday, 27 August 2025.
If you have any feedback, questions, or comments for me or the Committee, please feel free to reach out via our secretariat at AddictionMed@racp.edu.au
Professor John Saunders
Australasian Chapter of Addiction Medicine President
Awards, scholarships and prizes
The RACP Foundation offers fellowships, scholarships, grants, and prizes to members dedicated to advancing healthcare. More than 50 awards with a total value of $2.5M are available across different categories. There are also various other medals and prizes that recognise the exceptional contributions and achievements of our Fellows and trainees.
Nominate a colleague for a College award. Don’t miss the chance to celebrate excellence.
For more information, please email:
Expressions of interest
Adult Medicine Division Council
Upcoming events
RACP events
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11-12 October 2025: Hong Kong College of Physicians and Royal Australasian College of Physicians Joint Scientific Meeting – Save the date for this joint conference in Hong Kong.
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15-16 November 2025: AMD Leadership Workshop – Save the date for a face-to-face workshop in Wellington, Aotearoa NZ.
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