From the website:

Recruits: Paramedics follows the journey of everyday people setting out to achieve a lifelong ambition to become a paramedic. New recruits must first survive eight grueling weeks of medical theory and assessment at Paramedic College. Many have no medical background … they arrive with nothing more than an overpowering motivation to save lives. But this is a journey and a career that will also transform their own lives….

More insight can be found here Recruits Paramedics.

Starts this Thursday 13th October 1930 Channel 10

Both members made a purchase in the last twelve months that entitled them as members to enter the draw for a prize consisting of conference ticket including a conference dinner ticket, accommodation and airfares as required.

Your Paramedic Shop is a not for profit entity run for the benefit of all members, including SPA members right around Australia. Not only does your Paramedic Shop offer competitive prices on many products including text books and stethoscopes, but each year it holds this competition giving all members around Australia the opportunity to win.

The Paramedic Shop will announce the next competition shortly after the National Conference is held in Sydney. To make a purchase from your Paramedic Shop, go online 24/7 at www.paramedicshop.com.au and place your order!

The Paramedic Shop congratulates Matthew and Craig on their win and also takes the opportunity to thank all members from every State & Territory who not only supported your Paramedic Shop by making a purchase, but for taking part in the competition.

The College financials for the year were reported to be in a strong position and the strategic direction the Board has planned for ACAP NSW was well accepted by members leading up to and attending the AGM.

Three director positions were vacant for the meeting. The elected members to the 2011-12 Board are Ryan Lovett, Dr. Paula McMullen and Jordan Emery. The positions were contended for by a total on six nominations. The other nominees for the positions were Mark Trebley, Graham Munro and Buck Reed. All nominees are to be congratulated for nominating. It is great that there is a keen interest for members to get involved in your College.

The voting of director roles was held over until the Board meeting scheduled for early October due to three directors being on annual leave and/or overseas. Once the new full Board meet, the relevant positions will be filled and announced shortly thereafter. In the interim, the current positions will be maintained with Carpet Hughes remaining Chairman.

ACAP NSW Annual Report (10Mb)

The Annual Report will be presented by the Directors of ACAP NSW at the AGM to be held at the Ambulance Education Centre on Tuesday 13 September 2011 at 1700 hrs.

Current ACAP NSW members have been forwarded a proxy voting form and agenda for this meeting.

My name is Daniel Kearney and I am currently employed by the Ambulance Service of NSW (ASNSW) as Station Officer at Mudgee in the Central Tablelands.

In early January this year I received an email from the Paramedics Australasia NSW Branch (ACAP) announcing the availability of a scholarship for attendance at the National Rural Health Alliance Conference 2011 in Perth. It was to be held from the 13th to the 16th March at the Perth Convention Centre and ACAP were asking for Expressions of Interest from paramedics currently practicing in a rural or remote area who were interested in attending. I have been a paramedic in Mudgee now for 7 years, 5 of those as Station Officer. During this time I have developed a keen interest in rural paramedic practice and organisational issues faced in rural areas. I was delighted to be advised that my expression of interest had been successful out of quite a few submissions.

Close to 2 months later I was on a plane flying to the other side of the country for what was to a be an invaluable and unforgettable experience. Having never been to Perth previously, the opportunity of experiencing a new city along with meeting so many like minded professionals and hopefully learning a thing or two was inspiring to say the least.

Each of the 3 days of the conference were separated into “plenary sessions” and concurrent sessions. The plenary sessions were held in the Riverside Theatre, the largest of the lecturing rooms/theatres that were utilised through the conference. These were exclusive sessions, meaning that at the time this was the only presentation being held. The concurrent sessions, as the name suggests, had nine separate presentations occurring simultaneously in different areas throughout the conference centre. This provided the delegates the ability to tailor their attendance at subjects of interest or relevance to their particular area of practice.
The quality of lecturers/presenters was excellent and ranged from international experts in their field through to local, ground level health care workers/researchers. The subjects covered were just as varied and included themes such as interprofessional learning, health promotion and health initiatives in the indigenous community, mental health and strengthening rural communities through participation and ownership.

It quickly became evident that regardless of whether I thought the subject of the presentation was directly applicable to paramedic practice, there was something to be learned and gained from each and every presenter. I did however find that a few main themes were of particular interest and challenged me to consider their application in paramedic practice and within the ASNSW. The first of these was the retention of staff in rural and remote areas which continues to be an issue within many organisations in many parts of the country. Issues such as how to measure our staff turnover in rural areas properly and how to use this for future planning I found particularly interesting and challenging.

Interprofessional learning was a major theme on the first day of the conference and included several presentations on different models that have been used recently to foster and develop interprofessional learning. While these presentations were focussed predominantly on students from different disciplines working together during their training, it illustrated some of the missed opportunities we generally overlook in our day to day practice. The results presented by these professionals were very similar regardless of the location or disciplines involved and to see the apparent change in attitudes and appreciation for other health disciplines following these projects was inspiring and encouraging to say the least.

While I was aware of the use of art and music in health promotion, particularly in indigenous communities, I did not have a true appreciation of this subject prior to my attendance at the conference. During these presentations it became evident that one of the greatest benefits to attending this conference was the exposure to what our health colleagues are doing right around the country. This applies to so many different areas of health care, promotion and research. The appreciation I came away with for all of our health colleagues was immense and made me feel very proud to be involved with such a diverse, committed and brilliant workforce.

The networking opportunities at such a conference are endless. I met countless numbers of professionals, patient advocates, hospital board members, members of the public, presenters and more. Every single person having elected to attend and striving for the betterment of our rural and remote national health care system. Assisting with this networking was a “Superheroes Dinner” held in the Bellevue Ballroom at the Convention Centre on Monday evening. Entry to the dinner was included in the conference registration fee. The theme for the evening resulted in many attendees arriving in any number of superhero outfits. Buzz Lightyear, the Phantom, Superman, Wonderwoman and Leonardo from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were present to mention only a few. A spectacular 4 course meal with all beverages supplied overlooking the Swan River at night was an experience not to be forgotten. Many people I met at the dinner I spent time with in the ensuing 2 days and have remained in contact with since.

My scholarship included flights, accommodation along with registration and entry fees to the conference. I stayed at a hotel in the Perth CBD approximately 15 minutes walk from the Convention Centre. The Perth Convention Centre is located right on the spectacular Swan River in the heart of Perth and was a most appropriate venue for the conference. The conference is run by the National Rural Health Alliance Incorporated (NRHA) and is held every two years at different locations around Australia. The next conference will be held in Adelaide in 2013. The NRHA advocates for people in rural and remote areas of Australia to receive their fair share of health expenditure and services. It is the peak, non-government body in Australia for rural and remote health.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the board of Paramedics Australasia NSW for sponsoring me to attend the 11th National Rural Health Conference. It is an experience I can unreservedly recommend to anyone who thinks they might be interested. It is very fortunate that the NSW chapter is able to offer such scholarships to promote continuing paramedic education. I am planning to attend Adelaide in 2013.

The Hon Nicola Roxon (MP) addresses delegates

Our new name is Paramedics Australasia.

The motion was put to the membership following a unanimous board recommendation. At the specially convened EGM a secret ballot was conducted allowing the maximal representation of the membership by proxy voting. 79.23% of eligible votes were in favour of the motion and as such it was carried.

Paramedics Australasia will migrate progressively to the new name including website, stationary, and logo over the coming months.

The board is grateful to all members who attended the EGM, submitted proxy votes, and  have participated in this significant event in our history.

SCHOLARSHIP AVAILABLE TO ATTEND 11^th ANNUAL

NATIONAL RURAL HEALTH ALLIANCE CONFERENCE 

The Australasian College of Ambulance Professionals (NSW Branch) is calling for applications from members to be sponsored to attend the 11^th annual National Rural Health Alliance Conference (NRHA), to be held in Perth from the 13^th-16^th March 2011. We are pleased to announce we will be providing a scholarship for one member to accompany one of our rural Board directors to attend this conference and report back to members on the valuable experience and knowledge gained from attending the conference.

The applicant ideally would be, but not limited to, a current practicing rural paramedic that provides valuable pre-hospital emergency and non-emergency health care that is looking to expand their knowledge to be able to provide an enhanced service delivery to their community.

On return the applicant would be asked to produce an article to be published in our Response Journal and possibly speak at one of our Rural Conferences/Continuing Paramedic Education nights about the lessons learned and knowledge gained from some of the exceptional speakers that are on the programme to speak on a wide rage of topics. The scholarship would include return flights to Perth, accommodation for the duration of the conference and registration.

For more information on the National Rural Health Alliance Conference visit http://11nrhc.ruralhealth.org.au/

If this sounds like something you would be interested in please provide to the ACAP NSW board, in no more than one A4 page, a brief description of how you believe you would benefit from attending the 11^th annual National Rural Health Alliance Conference. Applications for this scholarship will need to be supported with the Scholarships Application Grant Form (attached) or can be downloaded on the ACAP website here. Applications can be emailed to scholarships@nsw.acap.org.au or mailed to P.O. Box 547, Strawberry Hills, NSW, 2012. Applications should be received by close of business 4^th February 2011.

Not an ACAP member? Join here

Paul McQuaid, a prehospital clinician and educator with extensive international experience will share with us his knowledge on the theory behind, and practice of, obtaining and analysing 12-lead ECGs. This presentation will be of significant benefit to pre-hospital practitioners of all clinical levels. Paul will be preceded by Paul Stewart, Project Manager of Cardiac Care in ASNSW, who will give the broad view of planned and implemented changes to the prehospital management of cardiac patients.

Light refreshments will be provided at the commencement of the evening, pizza at the conclusion of the session. CTP points may be available for this evening and a certificate will be issued to all who attend.

The Paramedic Shop will be open from 1100hrs to 2200hrs.

For more information, and to register for the evening please contact the CPE facilitator: suzie.davies@nsw.acap.org.au

When: 11th November 2010
Where: Mantra Resort, Ettalong Beach, NSW

Registration is available via the Paramedic Shop.

The following summary provides the key ideas raised during the Symposium and some notes from Roger’s experiences.

• People who reflect on their clinical practice become experts faster than those who do not.
• Novices learn from the acquisition of cases, competent clinicians become experts by the development of cues.
• Data loss at handover (eg to triage) is a significant problem. Formal handover methods such as “MIST” may help.
• Working memory (a key part of “thinking”) is easily disturbed, has limited capacity and duration and is adversely affected by interruptions, stress, uncertainty and anxiety.
• 25 000+ research papers looking at the space between perception (recognition) and a decision being made by a person. This “diagnosis” space is highly complex.
• The human brain is designed to see causal patterns and relationships – even if they do not exist.

The symposium was held in a hall next to a similar conference for the aviation industry and I was struck by the volume of literature produced by the various aviation safety bodies.  A whole table was covered in articles devoted to case studies of in-flight problems, issues with a particular type of aircraft or adverse event trends. The aviation industry didn’t seem to have any issues with airing its dirty laundry in public. They have a policy of generalising their problems so that if a problem occurs in a landing at Singapore, by nightfall pilots in Sydney and Santiago will know all about it.  How different to healthcare!

To this end the Patient Safety group at the Ambulance Service of NSW is to be praised for its “Lessons Learned” articles. These present de-identified findings from recent adverse event cases so that other paramedics can learn from them.  If this type of material interests you I can be contacted at: rprice@ambulance.nsw.gov.au

Ken Ladd Hudson has been an active member of the Institute of Ambulance Officers and ACAP. Ken joined the IOAO’s in 1977 and was elevated to full Member in 1977.  Ken has served as NSW Branch  Committee member and then President. Ken was the NSW representative on the National Fellowship Committee and has been Chair of the very successful NSW Medexchange Scholarship program, which provided NSW paramedics with the opportunities to study overseas.  Ken was inducted into the College as a Fellow in 1992.

On behalf of President Ian Patrick and the Board of ACAP we thank Ken for his service within ACAP and wish him a long and happy retirement.

John Hall LMACAP

In 2011, Charles Sturt University is introducing a new distance education course in EMS Leadership and Management. The course is designed to provide a postgraduate academic pathway for paramedics and emergency medical services (EMS) managers who wish to develop their knowledge and skills in emergency medical service leadership and management. The program will have an international perspective and focus on EMS systems, leadership, professional identity and evidence based management. The course articulates with the Master of Health Services Management and the Master of Health Science for those EMS managers who wish to further develop their leadership and management skills.

This course aims to:

1.      Provide students with a fundamental understanding of the major aspects of the leadership and management role as it applies within emergency medical services and ambulance services

2.      Assist students to develop managerial competencies by equipping them with the knowledge and skills necessary to facilitate effective and efficient practice at professional and organisational levels

3.      Enable students critically evaluate the relevance of different conceptual approaches to leadership and management issues

Entry to this program will be open to those paramedics and EMS managers with considerable managerial work experience who may not hold a bachelors degree or equivalent. Further details are available on the CSU website . You can also download the flyer.

Why and what for?

Who is eligible to enrol?
Applicants must hold a Bachelor of Clinical Studies (Paramedic), an equivalent qualification or considerable approved industry training and experience.

For more information..
Download the brochure here or view the CSU website at www.csu.edu.au.