Pam Harvey recently presented part of her PhD research at The Art of Good Health and Wellbeing, the 6th Annual International Arts and Health Conference held at the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne.

Entitled ‘Young adult fiction: giving a voice to ill adolescents” Pam’s presentation was part of the program that included presentations and workshops from researchers, artists, curators and clinicians using artistic projects in their work with patients and clients.

Radio National’s Life Matters, hosted by Natasha Mitchell, broadcast from the conference. You can download the audio of the program from the ABC website.

Oral language importance: Associate Professor Pamela Snow delivers the keynote speech at the 5th Brunei English Language Teachers’ Association Conference.

Associate Professor Pamela Snow, was the keynote speaker at 5^th Brunei English Language Teachers’ Association International Conference in November.

Pam’s speech was based on her research entitled “Oral Language Supports Early Literacy: A Pilot Cluster Randomised Trial in Disadvantaged Schools”.

She outlined some of the key drivers of early language competence – parental position on the social gradient, early language experience, exposure to written text and shared book-time at home, and neurodevelopmental disorders that can compromise early language development.

Pam highlighted the need for evidence-based early literacy instruction, encompassing the use of teaching approaches that are strongly informed by research linking early language skills to emergent literacy.

The association is sponsored and supported by several embassies and agencies, including the Australian Department of Education and the Australian Trade Commission.

The conference saw 14 paper presentations and workshops, highlighting issues of literacy and was attended by more than 100 participants.

Associate Professor Snow holds a conjoint appointment with the Department of Pyschiatry and the School of Rural Health, and is based in Bendigo. Follow her on her blog The Snow Report or Twitter @PamelaSnow2.

PhD candidate, Rouve Forbes (centre), takes questions with her supervisors, Marg Simmons (left) and Julie Willems (right)

How to prepare for and recover from bushfire was the subject of a community conference hosted by Federation University at Churchill in early October.

PhD student, Rouve Forbes, presented her research on the recovery of young adults after bushfire. A display of artwork by older people in local communities affected by the Black Saturday fires greeted conference participants on arrival. The artwork was created during Monash-run workshops. Matthew Carroll, Marg Simmons and Julie Willems were all present at information booths during the conference.

Marg Simmons and Matthew Carroll with artwork created during the Monash-run Regeneration workshops after the Black Saturday fires in Gippsland.

Dr Cathy Haigh from the School of Rural Health Latrobe Valley & West Gippsland attended this year’s Australian New Zealand Association for Health Professional Educators (ANZAHPE) conference on the Gold Coast. She gave an oral presentation on “Effects of Structuring Clinical Handover to Support Learning in Medical Students and Junior Doctors”.

“My presentation was scheduled in the last session of the last day, but was surprisingly well attended and generated a lively debate about the differences in education across different health professional groups,” she said.

“The intention is to continue this research to develop a teaching resource to support students learning from real clinical interactions, and that will vertically integrate clinical placements across Years 3B and 5D, in particular, and link these to postgraduate medical education.”

This year the conference was held at Griffith Health Centre at the Gold Coast campus of Griffith University. The $150 million facility operates in conjunction with the new 750-bed University Hospital and houses all health programs for the university on the one campus. It is certainly an impressive site both in terms of education and service delivery.

The pre-conference workshop on ‘Aligning Learning Experiences for Healthcare Students and Practitioners with Particular Learning Outcomes’ explored the challenges of learning in the workplace. Facilitated by Professor Stephen Billett, who was also a keynote speaker, it was a consideration that is very relevant for those of us coordinating curriculum delivery and supporting students during their clinical placement years, 3B, 4C and 5D.

Another keynote speaker, Dr Sarah Yardley, reported on her research with students learning in situ, describing the theory-to-practice gap and the frequently reported observation ‘that’s not how it works in the real world’. This disconnect can be a cause for concern for School of Rural Health students and is an issue that we would like to describe and address by further strengthening the links between the communities of practice (healthcare and academia) at our sites.

“The majority of the themes – innovation in health professional education, assessment, competencies and evidence, and theory-to-practice – very much resonated with me,” said Cathy.  “These areas are where we are directing our efforts in terms of medical education curriculum development and delivery, eg the Continuous Clinical Skills Curriculum initiative and local delivery of patient safety teaching and establishing and extending our research profile.”

Adelle McArdle from the School of Rural Health Churchill attended the Lactation Symposium hosted by Monash Health (formerly Southern Clinical School) in September in Clayton.

The symposium focused on some of the latest research findings on breast milk, lactation and breastfeeding. There was particular emphasis on the role of breast milk in pathological conditions such as infant and maternal infection, and the importance of human milk for infants admitted to the neonatal intensive care units.

“I heard the latest evidence and research finding on breast milk and its unique properties, from speakers who are considered leaders in their respective fields, including Associate Professor Donna Geddes.” Adelle said.

Associate Professor Donna Geddes, a senior researcher and current Head of the Hartmann Human Research Lactation Group at the University of Western Australia, agreed to present at an upcoming training forum for physiotherapists in the treatment of inflammatory conditions of the lactating breast in August 2015.

What tools are being used in the rural simulated environment to assess interdisciplinary effectivness? This was one of the questions Cathy Driver posed when she presented an overview of her research at the SimHealth 2014 conference in Adelaide in August. The conference explored the theme “Mind the Gap”, a reflection on how simulation-based initiatives have addressed a gap in the healthcare curriculum; assisted learners to bridge the gap between theory and practice; closed the gap between professional silos; or tackled the gap between best patient care and avoidable patient harm.

A clinical skills educator at SRH Bendigo, Cathy’s research is titled, “The effect of interdisciplinary simulation approaches in breaking down ‘tribalism’ in Healthcare” and asks the question, “How do the SIMPLE and TeamSTEPPS approaches work to increase communication and teamwork skills between undergraduate medical and nursing students in a rural simulated environment?” Cathy anticipates data collection will take place over a 12 month period.

Pam Harvey recently presented a paper about using young adult literature to teach health professionals about adolescent illness at the 12^th International Conference on Communication in Healthcare, hosted by the European Association for Communication in Healthcare (EACH).

‘Faults in their stars: Literature for teaching about adolescent illness’ identified award-winning young adult novels that articulate an otherwise unheard voice: that of the adolescent patient.

The conference delegates gathered in Amsterdam were health professional educators and researchers with a special interest in the health system and professional and service communication.

Pam said she found it interesting that her paper appeared to be the only one investigating how medical humanities can inform communication teaching, although she saw some posters with similar themes. (more…)

Laurea Atkinson from School of Rural Health East Gippsland had access to the best of simulation in Australia when she attended the SimHealth/SimTec T Conference in Adelaide.

Simulation on show came from sectors including healthcare, aviation, defences and games industries.

Laurea was one of five successful recipients of the SimHeatlh/SimTec T Conference travel awards. She presented a poster “Simulation Education in the Rural Sector: Can we make a difference?”.

The conference was attended by 650 delegates from Australia, America, United Kingdom, Korea, Israel and New Zealand.’

Following the opening welcome and a discussion on differences in the use of simulation within industries, there was a spectacular change of pace. The centre stage was transformed into a motor vehicle accident rescue, complete with emergency workers sliding down ropes from the rafters to a transformer designed vehicle utilised in training exercises for emergency services.

The poster hub showcased projects such as the development of a portable and sustainable simulation-based program for health professionals in rural and remote areas.

Laurea attended many and varied sessions over the three days of the conference including an oral presentation on “Camp Simulation – a Rural Initiative”. This session, which drew on involvement by the Ambulance Community Officers (ACOs) in rural and remote Victoria, was presented by Terry Houge.

Coordination of the training sessions for the ACOs is a joint effort in which Laurea is involved as the Simulated Learning Environment Project Officer for East Gippsland. It was a proud moment for Laurea to hear Terry present this report around such important training and learning initiatives.

Retention of NSW rural and remote GPs differs markedly according to both geographical remoteness and community population size, as well as according to a range of other factors including Visiting Medical Officer status, procedural activities, country of primary medical degree, conditional registration and coastal location.

These are some of the finding presented by Dr Deb Russell School of Rural Health Research from her research on the retention of rural and remote NSW general practitioners at the Primary Health Care Research conference in Canberra in July.

The conference theme was: Integrating knowledge exchange to improve primary health care outcomes. Deb’s presentation related to recently published research undertaken by herself, and John Humphreys and Matthew McGrail, at SRH and the Centre of Research Excellence in Rural and Remote Primary Health Care, as well as with key stakeholders from the NSW Rural Doctors Network. The research presented forms part of Deb’s PhD and fits closely with one of SRH’s strategic research direction themes: health services and workforce. Presenting this work strengthens the national profile of the School of Rural Health, according to Deb. (more…)

Dr Melinda Goodyear took advantage of numerous opportunities to showcase MUDRIH-led research when she attended a recent international conference on families with parental mental health challenges.

As an emerging early career researcher in this field, Melinda contributed in various ways to the ‘Fourth International Conference on Families with Parental Mental Health Challenges: Addressing the Needs of the Whole Family’, held at Berkeley, California during April.

Melinda secured SRH funding to attend the conference, which she described as “the major conference for our research group and the major international conference for the research field addressing supports for families where a parent has a mental illness (the FaPMI/COPMI research fields).”

The conference was attended by most major researchers in this field and Melinda delivered two oral presentations outlining her work, including an invited presentation in a plenary of family recovery. She also chaired a conference session. (more…)