Clinician's Guide to the First 2000 Days

The first 2000 days, from preconception to when a child starts school presents a critical window to establish healthy behaviours in parents and children.

Health behaviours during the first 2000 days influence the risk of lifelong disease, making prevention vital to ensuring optimum health and wellbeing for both mother and baby.

Integrating prevention into clinical care requires sensitive and nuanced conversations that support parents, children and families to actively engage with their own health, and the healthcare system.

Listen to the Clinicians Guide to the First 2000 Days podcast series, to deepen your clinical knowledge, enhance your care, and better support your patients during this pivotal time.

Clinicians Guide to the First 2000 Days podcast series has been created by Health and Wellbeing Queensland for health professionals.

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Clinician's Guide to the First 2000 Days

Trailer

March 13, 2025 • Health and Wellbeing Queensland

0:00 | 1:46

Welcome to the Clinician’s Guide to the First 2000 Days. This 9-episode podcast series is designed to empower and upskill health professionals in best practice preventive care for parents-to-be and parents of young children. Topics will cover the critical first 2000 days from preconception through to preschool years.

Podcast host Dr Sam Manger joins subject matter experts from across Queensland to explore a new topic in each episode, including preconception, antenatal care, postnatal care for mothers and babies, and toddler growth and development.

The Clinician’s Guide to the First 2000 Days podcast series builds on the success of the Clinician’s Guide to Healthy Kids podcast series, launched in 2023. Both series are available on the Clinicians Hub, a digital repository of tools, resources and training designed to help health professionals discuss, identify, prevent and manage chronic disease.

How do we set up a child for success?

The first 2,000 days of a child’s life, from pre-conception through to the age of five is a critical period to shape their physical, mental, and social development. It is a time of life where healthy behaviours can be established, links to support and services founded and when a child’s biology is most amenable to change and influenced by their environment.

I’m Dr Sam Manger, a General Practitioner and host of the Clinician’s Guide to the First 2000 Days podcast series.

In this series, I’ll be talking to some of Queensland’s leading health experts to learn how clinicians can better support children, parents and future parents and make a real difference through preventative health.

We’ll explore the key moments in the first 2,000 days where health professionals can embed prevention into clinical care in effective and empathetic ways to improve health outcomes.

The first 2,000 days of a child’s life start before they’re even born.

This podcast will help you understand what future parents can do to improve the long-term health of a child before becoming pregnant, without focusing on weight.

We’ll also talk about effective ways to support a healthy pregnancy and reduce the risk of pregnancy complications for both mother and child.

These moments, as well as the first 12 months and early childhood, are opportunities to build positive physical and mental health of children and their parents.

This podcast will include advice on how best to connect families to relevant support services throughout their first 2000-day journey.

Listeners can also learn more about the next stage of a child’s health in our previous season, Clinician's Guide to Healthy Kids.

Together, we can make healthy happen for everyone.

The Clinician’s Guide to the First 2000 Days is brought to you by the Queensland Government, through Health and Wellbeing Queensland, the state’s prevention agency.