My name is Bianca Knight I am a proud Biripi woman and a second year Doctor of Medicine student at the University of Sydney. I completed my Undergraduate studies in Nursing at the University of Wollongong, and worked as an Indigenous Nursing Cadetship with the Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network. I adored paediatric medicine and went on to work as a Registered Nurse in specialty areas including paediatric cardiology, neurology, and neonatology.

It was my time in neonatology that I really found my love for women’s and children’s health. I was able to work in collaboration with mothers, their families and their newborn babies.

I have a passion for Indigenous women’s and children’s health. I hope to specialise in General Practice with sub-specialist training in in these areas. I plan to open my own clinics one day, providing women’s antenatal and perinatal care, and hope to establish a model of care which integrates Indigenous birthing culture (birthing on country) with up-to-date, evidence-based practice.

I have completed two of my four third-year examinations in the Doctor of Medicine program at the University of Sydney. I am now completing my 13-week MD Research Block, which is abutted by the four examination periods at the beginning, and end of the academic year. I have met the expected standard (MES/Passed), for all of my examinations this year so far. We do not have any holidays until the latter end of the year, for which we get 4 weeks in December before recommencing full-time study in our final year as of 5^th January 2026 (Elective Term).

I have loved my time completing child and adolescent medicine this year. It has been a transformative experience, so much so, that it has solidified my passion for paediatrics. I have organised to complete my final-year elective term in the Paediatric Emergency Department at the Children’s Hospital Westmead. I hope to further develop my passion and knowledge of acute paediatric emergency care. This will be important moving forward in my career and hope to be value in preparing me for regional and remote placements.

I am planning my application for Internship with a strong preference for rural and remote locations within Australia. I am considering areas such as Western Australia, New South Wales, Queensland, or the Northern Territory. I hope to subsequently pursue the Paediatric Specialist Training Pathway and contribute meaningfully to improving the health and wellbeing of children and families.

I am presently completing my MD Research Project which is a retrospective cohort study examining the past 20 years of Sudden Infant Deaths (SIDS) and Sudden Unexplained Death in Infancy (SUDI), in Sydney. I will be reporting on temporal, epidemiological trends and how they have developed over time. I have been completing data collection at the Forensic Medicine and Coroners Court Complex in Lidcombe 8am – 4.30pm Monday to Friday. It has been a very busy time, with data cleaning, coding and SPSS training outside of these business hours. I will commence data analysis in the upcoming weeks, using SPSS to conduct chi-square and t-tests on the dataset. I will be presenting my project in August with submission for a final paper and potential publication to come.

At the start of the year I went into perinatal women’s health and was able to help deliver seven babies in the first week.   I have had lots of support and financial support from Rotary has allowed me to truly focus on my studies and have access to highly valuable education tools such as Osmosis, Amboss, and medical databases.

I would like to kindly extend my thanks again, as it truly has shaped my University experience in a positive way.