Prepare to work alongside others and prepare for change. That was the advice paediatric specialist and senior University of Otago academic Prof Don Roberton gave biomedical and health sciences students at their graduation ceremony in the Dunedin Town Hall on Saturday.
Prof Roberton, who is about to retire as health sciences pro vice-chancellor and dean of the faculty of medicine, said no matter where graduates lived and worked they would be part of extensive collaborative networks and would always be part of change.
At the most basic level, humans were physically built as networks, he said.
Three billion paired nucleotides made up 30,000 genes packaged into 23 chromosomes. Paired chromosomes were in every cell, cells formed tissues which were networks of interacting cells, tissues formed larger organs, and integrated organs allowed humans to be whole functioning individuals.
"But this is only the start of the network story. As individual beings, we are born into families, with all their own interactions, needs and crises. And we and our families are part of our communities, our villages, townships, cities, and countries. Then the next step is our global existence and relevance, and our interaction with our environment."
It was important for health professionals to remember that nothing they did would be in isolation.
"We are part of networks of health teams. Each part of our health team has important contributions to make that are greater than those we can make alone. Teamwork is the essence of good health care."
Humans were also subject to continual change, he said.
"As a paediatrician, I have had the privilege of working with those in the early years of life, when there are times of dramatic change in short periods of time.
"[In] the first two years ... we double our birth weight by the age of five months, and triple our birth weight by our first birthday ... Our brain grows and matures at its most rapid rate during our first two years, and then seems to slow for the rest of our lives."
As graduates entered the workforce, they should know they would continue to change with the cycle of time.
"It is OK to change careers, OK to take up new opportunities, to change countries, to change employment, to take time out, to see new challenges, to take on new learning, to find new ways of doing things. My time as a paediatrician has taught me that there is excitement, hope, opportunity, and variety for us throughout a professional life which is full of changes."
It was a "huge privilege" to provide for the health needs of others, Prof Roberton said, urging graduates to be "be careful observers, thoughtful doers and compassionate givers".
• Photos by Jane Dawber; prints available from otagoimages.co.nz.
