Gippsland Year 4B student Sarah Simon enjoyed attending a conference on rural obstetric care and is urging other students with an interest in this area to put their hand up for next year’s meeting, which will be in Mildura. Here is her report on this year’s event.

I was fortunate to be sponsored by RAMUS to attend the RANZCOG (Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology) Provincial Fellows Meeting Annual Scientific Meeting in Mackay, Queensland.

By attending this conference I was able to meet rural General Practitioners and Obstetricians and discuss issues pertaining to rural obstetric care. Over the course of three days we had lectures and teaching about topics including obstetric emergencies, contraception, transport of women in labour to tertiary hospitals, workforce shortage and current areas of research from trainees.

As a year 4C student this experience was very valuable for me. All of the topics were relevant to my current study of women’s health, especially considering my placement in Gippsland.

I would thoroughly recommend any Year 4C students with an interest in women’s health to apply to attend this conference next year in Mildura.

Interested students can go to the RANZCOG website for more information.

–        Sarah Simon, Year 4B Gippsland

Following the success of last year’s End of Year break-up at Old Gippstown, the Gippsland Regional Clinical School has booked the venue, and Santa as well, for Sunday 25 November.

Further information will follow closer to the time but all those likely to attend are asked to note it in their diaries. Old Gippstown is a heritage park in Moe where many original buildings from the across the Gippsland region are maintained and numerous Christmas and other events are held.

Your name and position

Melanie (Mel) Craig – Administrative Officer, Rural Education Program

Describe your job/role

I manage the rural placements for MBBS students from years 2 to 5 and help Laura, Gayle and our academic and professional staff deliver the year 1 and 2 program. I liaise with Year 1 and 2 students who are still centrally located here on Clayton campus, provide administrative support and consultation to the WILDFIRE Rural Health Student Club and also provide executive support to Judi Walker whilst she is at Clayton.

I also project assist in the implementation of the RCTS program. It has been very exciting being part of the development of new programs.

Why is it important?

I get to be a part of and work with inspiring staff and students. It makes me part of the team of academic and professional staff at our rural sites working towards building great rural medical doctors and developing an innovative and professional rural program and school that can have the same inspiration as the one founded by Roger Strasser 20 years ago.

What is the best aspect of your work with the School of Rural Health?

The variety of people I get to work with. The School of Rural Health has staff from different walks of life and bring different skills to their role. I feel like I am always learning.

When you are not at work, what do you enjoy doing?

As you (readers of RHM) already know raising puppies. I love spending time with (husband to be in December) Cam and our Australia Cattle Dogs Cain and Ziva.

I looooooove cooking, having been raised by my grandmother who was Spanish. My love of food extends to growing it, so getting out in the garden. I love getting into a good book, movie/TV series or craft project. I love hanging out with friends and being a big kid with their kids. Cam actually got asked the other day what I was like to live with; his reply was it is like living with a mix of Dawn French and Nigella Lawson. I love cooking food, eating it, eating with others, being hilariously funny and just being an idiot like singing to the dogs (nothing wrong with that is there?).

What was your most recent holiday destination and why did you choose it?

Tasmania (mmm, six years ago or more) I did it as a treat for Cam for putting up with me in my first year of uni. Living with a student can be a nightmare.

If you were Emperor for a day, what is one thing you would implement?

I need to put in a funny one and serious one. The funny one would be to install jumping castles at work, what an interesting way to have meetings especially video conferences, and secretly good for afternoon nanna naps in the sunshine. Seriously, I would share the wealth across the world to stamp out behaviour brought on by poverty.

Surprise us! What is something about you that most of your peers would not know?

When I came in for my interview at MBBS Assessment, I knocked back a chance to go into Channel 7 and be on ‘Deal or no Deal.’ Regret or not? I will never know – I could have been 50 cents richer or $200,000 dollars richer or something in between. Would I be any better off? Probably not as Cam would have brought a motorbike and something else and …

Gippsland Medical School has welcomed two new appointments, Ms Michelle Machado and Dr Nicole Wallis.

Both have qualifications in the biomedical sciences and will make significant contributions to theme III teaching. They will also play important roles in the implementation of MBBS assessment in the Gippsland region.

Nicole’s areas of expertise are neuroscience and pharmacology. She has recently completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the Howard Florey Research Institute. Nicole will support assessment implementation across Years A, 3B and 4C.

Michelle has been associated with the school since 2009 and impressed with the quality of her teaching. She will be responsible for the coordination of Year A assessment and will provide support to assessment in the other years of the program when required. She will continue to be involved in the Year A anatomy program and teach some aspects of physiology.

Michelle and Nicole officially started their new appointments in mid September.

Michelle Machado

Nicole Wallis

Two staff members from East Gippsland journeyed to Sydney last month for a national Sim Health conference. This report is by one of the members, Academic coordinator/lecturer Loy Perryman.

Marnie Connolly from the Bairnsdale campus and I were fortunate to attend the Sim Health 2012 Conference in Sydney. The conference was designed to bring experts from around the world and Australia together to share new aspects of simulation learning, the theme being around ‘Making Teams Work.

Throughout the week I attended sessions on moulage which gave handy, quick and inexpensive tips in creating more realistic simulated patient scenarios without the use of significant staff and other resources.

It was reassuring to hear from plenary speaker, Dr KT Waxman, Associate Professor at the University of San Francisco School of Nursing and Health Professional Chair, DNP Department Director of California Simulation Alliance, California Institute for Nursing and Health Care, USA.

Dr Waxman spoke about the evolution of a state wide simulation alliance in California which has established governance and polices for high quality simulation in a sustainable environment.

This was of particular interest to me, as East Gippsland has begun talks with the aim of establishing alliances with external organisations involved in simulation in the Gippsland area.

We are excited by these developments and look forward to incorporating many of the concepts outlined at the Conference with further development of a formalised teamwork approach to simulation between EGRCS and other Gippsland stakeholders.

By Loy Perryman, Academic coordinator/lecturer

The RETAINR team at MUDRIH, from left, Adrienne Forsyth (Research Project Assistant), Dr Margaret Stebbing (Team Leader), Marillyn Harkness (Project Administrator).

Adrienne Forsyth has joined the Retention of Allied Health Professionals at Retirement Age in Rural Victoria (RETAINR) study team at MUDRIH as Research Project Assistant.

Adrienne holds degrees in Human Nutrition and Exercise Physiology and is in the writing up stage of a PhD thesis.

The RETAINR research and action study aims to identify important beliefs and attitudes of those who decide to continue to work as an allied health professional beyond retirement age.

Allied Health Professionals aged 55 years or more, who are retired or about to retire, who live in rural Victoria or intend relocating from the city to a rural area in retirement, are all invited to participate in this study.

Further information email adrienne.forsyth@monash.edu or see the RETAINR recruiting website.

An invitation is extended to all education, clinical, research staff and students to take part in the Journal Club for the School of Rural Health, which will next meet on Wednesday 10 October from noon to 1pm.

The next article for discussion is: ‘Researcher-decision-maker partnerships in health services research: Practical challenges, guiding principles.’

Anne Hofmeyer, Cathie Scott and Laura Lagendyk

BMC Health Services Research 2012, 12:280 doi:10.1186/1472-6963-12-280

Background information and questions for discussion are as follows.

Health researchers are under increasing pressure to ensure decision makers, such as health service managers, practitioners and policy makers, are represented in research teams to assist with effective translation of research findings into practice. This can give rise to practical challenges.

This paper identifies the involvement of organisational “insiders” as a particular issue for health services research. Based on the authors’ experience, some guiding principles are presented for dealing with the ethical concerns arising from such partnerships.

Questions for discussion include:

• Are the guiding principles presented useful? Adequate? Realistic?

• The paper focuses on the challenges associated with members of the research team being identified in qualitative interview transcripts as participants in the case. Do similar ethical challenges arise when working closely with health services using other research methods e.g. audit and feedback, observation of practice, consumer interviews? If so, what guiding principles could we suggest to guide researchers?

• Do you think working in a regional/rural context poses any additional challenges, or confers any advantages, compared to more populated settings when managing the risks associated with decision maker involvement in research?

Hopefully the paper will encourage people to consider how they approach research partnerships, so participants are encouraged to bring their own experiences of working with decision makers/health services to the discussion.

The facilitator is Penny Buykx and those interested can join by:

• attending Meeting Room 3 (Level 2), School of Rural Health, 26 Mercy St Bendigo or
• by videoconference (IP 130.194.213.113) or
• teleconference (9903 5988) from other sites.

Marg Simmons

Dr Marg Simmons has addressed lecturers in the Monash Sustainability Institute on a new module used for Year A graduate medical students at Gippsland Medical School.

Marg gave a presentation called Teaching Health and Sustainability to lecturers at Clayton on the module which introduces the students to the topic of Sustainability and Health.

The presentation was part of the Education for Sustainability (EfS) Module for academic staff undertaking the Graduate Certificate in Academic Practice and was based on her work on introducing a module on sustainability. The module explores issues such as sustainability in the healthcare profession; the impacts a changing environment might have on society and the health care system; and the notion of healthy and sustainable communities.

Monash University is very committed to sustainability in all of its practices – as reflected by its inclusion in the university’s mission statement – and is therefore keen that its staff embed sustainability across the board as well incorporating innovative teaching approaches to fulfil this endeavour.

Professor Geoff Rose, who led the EfS module, commented that such teaching “exemplifies the tactical approach to education renewal which Marg sees as critically important to embedding sustainability in all education programs at Monash.”

He added: “Participants at the presentation found your presentation to be very valuable and I believe it will be very influential in motivating them to embark on a similar journey.”

The elements of art and science and how they work together to support healthcare simulation will be the focus of the next in the School of Rural Health Technology In-service series.

Professor Debra Nestel will be exploring the concept in the session, titled ‘The art and science of audiovisual capture and replay in healthcare simulation’ held on Wednesday 17 October from 1 pm to 2 pm.

The session will be via a recorded videoconference. Those interested can participate in person by travelling to MUDRIH, Moe, or via video or audio link-up.

To join in via video:

• From inside Monash: 35929
• From outside Monash: 35929@monash.edu or 130.194.20.3 then enter conference 29

To join the conference from a telephone (audio only):

• From a Monash phone: 35929
• From outside Monash: +61 3 990 35929

If you have any questions, please contact Julie Willems at Julie.Willems@monash.edu or leave a message on (03) 5128 1030.

The monthly School of Rural Health Educational Technology In-service Program is now online on the school intranet. Videos, PowerPoints and other resources are available for each of the in-services conducted.

To watch the video recordings of the presentations and/or view a copy of the associated resources for each, go to the in-service page on the intranet.

There is also a feedback link alongside each presentation, and your feedback on the presentations and the various resources is welcomed.

If you  have any questions or would like to present on a matter in the in-service series please contact Julie Willems on +61 3 5128 1030 or email Julie.Willems@monash.edu