The philosophy of paediatric teaching: An interview with Dr Nikolaos Myriokefalitakis, former Clinical Director of the ‘Penteli’ Children's Hospital in Athens (Greece)

Dr Nikolaos Myriokefalitakis, one of the most experienced paediatricians in the city of Athens, Greece, has worked as a consultant paediatrician at the ‘P. & A. Kyriakou’ Children's Hospital for more than 25 years, while during the 2004–2011 period, he was the clinical director of the 1st Paediatric Department of the ‘Penteli’ Children's Hospital. Under his leadership, in 2008, his department was renovated by ‘Stavros Niarchos Foundation’ and was organised as one of the most modern and exemplary national paediatric departments in Greece. Having the title of the ‘teacher in paediatrics’ by his junior Greek colleagues, he supports that clinical experience obtained through ward-based bedside teaching is the fundamental principle of paediatric teaching. He notes that paediatric diagnosis is performed thorough medical history and detailed physical examination of the patient and it is rarely established with the help of laboratory, common or specialised, investigations. According to Dr Myriokefalitakis, a modern paediatric department cannot function ‘in a vacuum’, but requires technological support, adequate medical and nursing personnel and team-working between paediatricians and experts on paediatric subspecialties and other basic specialties. He accepts that the current financial crisis in Greece has clearly affected negatively the clinical practice of primary as well as hospital-based paediatric care, while he regrets to note that as the years go by, physicians become more obsessed with defense medicine and technology. He suggests that it is necessary to distinguish paediatric virology from virology and he ends up encouraging the improvement of paediatric training in Greece highlighting the basic need to ‘train the trainers’ in medical education.