This week on the podcast we spoke with Adjunct Associate Professor Nicola Cunningham. Nicola holds dual specialist Fellowships in Clinical Forensic Medicine and Emergency Medicine. She maintains clinical positions as a Senior Forensic Physician at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, Emergency Physician at St Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne, Academy Member with the Patient Safety Review Team at Safer Care Victoria, and Practitioner Member with the Victorian Medical Board of Australia (Victoria). Nicola combines her clinical work with leadership, teaching, research and advocacy in the fields of clinical forensic medicine, emergency medicine, medical ethics, law, and patient safety.

Her diverse academic writing includes international emergency medicine textbooks, law journals and her work as co-founder and editor of The Communiqués. These are free-to-access educational publications highlighting lessons learned from coroners’ investigations into preventable deaths in healthcare settings. The unique and highly innovative print and podcast editions of the three series of The Communiqués (Clinical, Residential Aged Care, and the Future Leaders) are used widely as teaching resources and have been shown to prompt readers to initiate change in their professional practice to improve patient safety.

We cover a lot of ground with Nicola, from the nexus of forensic medicine and emergency care and the impact of access block on patient safety, a particularly timely discussion and the focus of the most recent edition of the Clinical Communiqué.