Ambos at simulation workshops
Paramedic Terry Houge from Orbost is pictured taking Ambulance Community Officers through a scenario at the workshop in Bairnsdale.
Ambulance Community Officers in Far East Gippsland are receiving excellent professional development through a program run by East Gippsland Regional Clinical School in association with Paramedic Community Support Coordinators.
East Gippsland Regional Clinical School, Bairnsdale was successful last year in securing a simulation grant from Health Workforce Australia (HWA) to support clinical education for the East Gippsland region.
The campus was able to purchase sophisticated simulation mannequins to support professional development and collaboration between health professionals, and provide opportunities for inter-professional educational activities at a local level.
Creation of the Simulated Learning Environment project, under the leadership of Marnie Connolly and supported by project officer Laurea Atkinson, has also created opportunities to support an outreach program for health care professionals.
As part of this program, a series of workshops is being held at the Bairnsdale campus, with Ambulance Community Officers from Mallacoota and Omeo participating in simulation scenarios. These are run by Paramedic Community Support Coordinators, Terry Houge from Orbost and Scott Fyfe from Omeo.
Ambulance Community Officers are all volunteers in their local community. Sophisticated technology allows them to experience lifelike simulated events. The hands-on experience in collaborative patient care develops skills particularly advantageous to health care workers in remote areas.
Terry and Scott both agree that such hi–tech training is designed to give the Ambulance Community Officers a controlled training environment yet one that is as real as possible. They also believe opportunities such as this are an invaluable tool for paramedics and Ambulance Community Officers from remote areas.
A program of workshops will be held over the next few months with Ambulance Community Officers visiting from the relatively remote communities of Mallacoota, Omeo and Cann River.
The project is possible due to funding made available by Health Workforce Australia.