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In This Issue:
BWH Bulletin recently sat down with Terrie Inder, MD, MBChB, chair of Pediatric Newborn Medicine, to discuss her goals for the department and reflect on her experiences since joining BWH in September 2013.
Before coming to BWH, Inder was a professor of Pediatrics, Neurology and Radiology at Washington University School of Medicine and director of the Washington University Neonatal Development Research team.
How did you first become interested in pediatric newborn medicine?
I always planned on being a family physician, and then I realized during medical school that it didn’t excite me as much as I had hoped. I fell in love with pediatric newborn medicine because it’s multi-faceted. Babies are so straightforward and amazingly strong. They have a diverse number of conditions and problems, and yet exhibit incredible resilience.
What initially attracted you to BWH?
The excitement and challenge of a new department being formed with a focus on my area of passion—the newborn—coupled with the institution’s support and the opportunity to work with and further develop an incredible faculty were the reasons I wanted to join BWH.
What priorities have you been addressing since you arrived at BWH?
Our department has developed a new organizational structure that will help enhance our position as a national leader in neonatal care, research and education, with a particular focus on neonatal neurology. The restructuring will allow for the department to have more diverse representation across a number of BWH committees and boards and enable parents and families to be more involved in their infant’s care.
We have also restructured our residency program to provide more structured learning in the area of the newborn infant. In addition, we are looking at career development pathways for our junior faculty and the opportunities they have to become phenomenal physicians and scientists.
What goals do you hope to achieve?
As the hospital raises money to build a new state-of-the-art Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, we are also looking at ways to deliver care that is even more family-centered and of the highest quality. This has included initiatives aimed at improving parent engagement.
How do you bridge your dual roles in clinical administration and science?
It’s a challenge, but I’m hoping as our infrastructure becomes more finalized, I will have more time to devote to research. I currently follow three cohorts of babies around the world who I have taken care of in the past: those who are now 5 years old in St. Louis, Missouri; 13-year-olds in Melbourne, Australia; and 16-year-olds in New Zealand. My studies have focused on infants at high risk for brain injury and investigating ways to diagnose these injuries accurately and early, and develop treatments and preventive strategies to reduce subsequent disabilities.
What recent innovations are you excited about?
Our department has just purchased a human milk analyzer that will enable us to study mothers’ milk and learn about how much variation there is in protein calorie content to see if we can optimize nutrition in our babies to improve brain development. Once we know more, we’ll turn our attention to the babies’ experiences and explore some non-pharmacological techniques that we could apply to reduce babies’ stress, such as stroking.
What do you want the BWH community to know about the department?
We consider ourselves privileged to care for BWH’s tiniest patients and their families. We are excited to be recognized and celebrated as a department in the BWH family. We want to be known as the place where your sick baby would be cared for in the most special and highly skilled way. Who or what inspires you?
My husband, Jeff, inspires me every day. My mentor, Joe Volpe, a specialist in neurology at Boston Children’s Hospital, inspires me as a clinician and scientist. My children inspire me to be a better person. The babies we care for inspire me because we want to do a better job so that their lives can be the best possible.
Her Favorite Things...
Book genre: Crime
Hobbies: Cooking, gardening and spending time with her husband and five children
Sports: A New Zealand native, Inder enjoys cheering on the New Zealand All Blacks rugby team.