Surgical interest group expands training to regions
Saving sim man: the surgical interest group set up various stations for students at its Bendigo surgical trauma night.
In mid July, the Monash University Surgical Interest Group (MUSIG) held its inaugural Surgical Trauma Night at the Bendigo Regional Clinical School.
MUSIG has held similar workshops in metropolitan hospitals for clinical school students at Eastern Health and The Alfred Hospital as well as workshops for Pre-Clinical students at Monash University.
Given the success of those workshops, MUSIG wanted to expand the events to students based in rural hospitals.
The aims of this event were to educate and inspire medical students about the exciting area of surgery and specifically about trauma and its application to rural medicine. At Bendigo 32 students from years 1 to 5 attended the night, many based locally as well as some from metropolitan hospitals.
Seven tutors – Adele Callaghan, Ms Janine Arnold, Dr Gayan Padamasekara, Dr Andy Ang, Dr Yen Lim, Dr Julie Chan and Dr Chris Mitchell – volunteered their time to help out and guide the students through four different stations.
The stations included a post-operative trauma simulation where they had to keep Bendigo’s one and only sim man alive, an orthopaedic station where students had the opportunity to put plates and screws into fake bones, a basic surgical skills station where they got to learn various stiches on pork bellies and an airway management station where they learnt about the importance of airway management during trauma.
The support from the School of Rural Health, Smith and Nephew through the provision of sutures, instruments, orthopaedic sawing bones and drills all contributed to the success of the night. There has been excellent feedback from the students who attended the night and MUSIG hopes that these workshops will continue in Bendigo into the future.
The Group also hopes to expand these workshops into other rural sites in the years to come.
By Jennifer Tang
MUSIG Rural Representative 2012