Doctors, nurses and paramedics from Gloucester, Bulahdelah and Dungog spent Thursday May 26 at the Gloucester Soldiers Club workshopping how to recognise and treat urgent health issues for adults and children. 

The federally funded Emergency Medicine Education and Training Outreach program is run annually for rural communities without emergency doctors. Gloucester’s doctors are general practitioners who are required to work in the emergency department of the hospital.

Larger sites have specially trained doctors working in their emergency departments. This program has been set up to support the continuous learning required by doctors and nurses in regional hospitals.

Dr Fiona Downes and Dr Tim Stewart, two emergency specialist doctors from John Hunter Hospital, led the sessions which covered things like how to deal with snake bites and severe asthma attacks. 

“We want to build on skills that are already here,” says Dr Downes.

She says it’s an opportunity to pass on extra skills about how to deal with really sick patients. To provide the medical staff with the latest and most up to date service and how to access it. 

Around 20 people attended the free event managed by the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine. This unique experience also provided a network building day for the regions’s health care professionals.