Registrations are now open for the 2022 CRANAplus Conference.
To join the remote healthy community in Adelaide from 4-6 October, head to our conference website.
Your Stories
This is where we tell your stories, cover topical issues and promote meaningful initiatives
Remembering Ray Wyeth
On October 11 2021, Nurse and Midwife Raymond Clifford Wyeth tragically lost his life while working in an ambulance in Stanwell, Central Queensland, along with the patient he was caring for. Ray’s…
Singing from the same song book
A stalwart in the remote nursing policy space, Heather Keighley joined CRANAplus as Senior Policy Adviser in December 2021. She discusses policy issues affecting remote area nursing, collaborating…
COVID-19 Safety on CRANAplus Courses
Deputy CEO and Executive Director of Education, Amelia Druhan, outlines CRANAplus’ COVIDsafe protocols for course delivery. Designed to keep the workforce and vulnerable communities safe, these…
2021 Membership Survey results: listening to your voice
The results of the 2021 CRANAplus Membership Survey are in. Find out why your colleagues stay remote, how COVID-19 has affected the workforce, and the advocacy priorities identified by our…
From ED to PHC: Leonie’s Leap of Faith
Leonie Higgs made a ‘leap of faith’ into remote health in late 2021 when she took a primary health care position in Cape York. We caught up with her in January to discuss her new sense of purpose,…
Improving safety in remote clinics: a Q&A with Laura Wright
RN and research student Laura Wright discusses the findings of The Remote Area Safety Project, her mixed methods study involving a literature review, survey, interviews, and policy analysis. What are…
Celebrating the life of NP Cathy Woods
Michelle Dowden recalls her wonderful Galiwin’ku Island colleague, Cathy Woods, who passed away in 2021 but who lives on in treasured memories of distributing ice-cream on Boxing Day and 3am debriefs…
Student Story: Immersion in Emergency
Lucas Revell from Edith Cowan Uni reflects on his month in Esperance, spent consolidating his emergency nursing skills by facing new presentations – including septic shock and mastocytosis – and…
Student Story: Building clinical reasoning in a less critical environment
Days spent gaining skills in venepuncture, arrhythmias, and wound care. Nights spent enjoying the Territory’s best chicken wings and cooling down in the local swimming pool with friends. Charles…
Fellow in Focus: Kathryn Zeitz
Kathryn Zeitz, an avid sponsor of the CRANAplus scholarship program to fund remote placements for health students, has fond memories of discovering the existence of our organisation back in 1998.
Moral injury and the COVID-19 pandemic
Have the pressures of the COVID-19 pandemic forced you to do things at work that go against your moral principles? You may be experiencing moral injury and its symptoms of guilt, anger, and…
MEC course updates incoming
A recent survey of Maternity Emergency Care (MEC) course participants is guiding updates to CRANAplus’ MEC Program. Using the feedback you provided, the Education Team are now busy updating the…
End of an Era: Farewell to Long-time Facilitator, Rosemary Moyle
A facilitator on the CRANAplus REC Course since the very beginning, Rosemary Moyle continued to bring her wide-ranging experience to CRANAplus courses until 2021. As she hangs up the boots, Rosemary…
Let’s CHAT about Dementia
The Let’s CHAT Dementia research project is set to drive research-informed best practice dementia care for Indigenous Australians living in rural and remote areas. Dallas McKeown, who is a member of…
SMS 4 Dads heads to rural and remote Australia
The call is out to all rural and remote health workers to spread the word to new dads and dads-to-be about a free text-based service designed especially for them.
Being an AHP during the pandemic
Geoffrey Ganambarr from the Marthakal Homelands Health Service has been an Aboriginal Health Practitioner for 11 years. His challenging role involves being the first point of contact and providing…
How is stroke retrieval changing?
“For the first time in Australia’s history, the Stroke Alliance aims to close the health care gap in providing stroke care across our vast continent,” says Skye Coote (NP, CCRN, MN, NVRN-BC,…
Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder Myth Busting with NOFASD Australia
CRANAplus catches up with Robyn Smith, the Helpline Manager for the National Organisation for Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (NOFASD), to tackle four common Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder myths.
New resources to improve Quality Use of Medicines
NPS MedicineWise has just released three new resources to make it easier to follow a quality use of medicines (QUM) approach and reduce pressure on nurses moving between communities.
Student story: earning independence
University of Notre Dame nursing student Jennifer Kuppens discusses how her placement in Kununurra District Hospital improved her time-management skills, confidence and ability to prioritise…
Student story: my intrastate odyssey
University of Wollongong Nutrition and Dietetics student Gynette Reyneke recalls her placement in Broken Hill. A warm welcome, heritage and culture, and rewarding project work awaited her in the far…
Equal opportunities needed for all health students
Two thirds of nursing students never had the opportunity to complete a rural or remote placement, recent National Rural Health Student Network (NRHSN) research has shown. NRHSN Chair Jean-Baptiste…
Kellie Kerin: Upfront about Trauma, Turnover & Culture Shock
Short-lived attention to workplace safety for nurses and midwives in remote settings is nothing new. If RN Kellie Kerin, the NT Indigenous representative on the CRANAplus Nursing and Midwifery…
Meet 2022 OAM, Vicki O’Donnell from Kimberley Aboriginal Medical Services
Vicki O’Donnell, a Nyikina Mangala woman from Derby in Western Australia, is the third person in her family to receive the OAM for community work. Here she talks about the influence of her family and…
Improve your triage competency, online
CRANAplus recently launched Triage Emergency Care Online, a scheduled online course that makes triage competency attainable to remote health professionals who are affected by COVID-19 restrictions or…
New tool to fight infection in the tropics
Tropical areas across the top of Australia have a very high rate of potentially dangerous skin and other infections – and a very low level of information to support clinicians in treating these…
Neuroprotective developmental care
Dr Pamela Douglas, the Medical Director of Possums & Co., discusses the Neuroprotective Developmental Care Accreditation Pathway, for which the charity is offering 300 scholarships. She also…
Why we stay and why we leave
As part of her Flinders University Master’s of Remote and Indigenous Health, RN Jacki Argent interviewed seven experienced RANs for her study ‘Why we stay or leave and what we value: a qualitative…
A tropical transition to remote
We catch up with Madison Clark, RN with the Torres and Cape Hospital and Health Service, to find out what it’s like to work near ‘the most beautiful beaches’, witness the impacts of health promotion…
Wound care training in remote NT
The Australasian Foundation for Plastic Surgery has conducted 20 wound care workshops and counting in the Top End, paving the way for faster-healing wounds, fewer infections, and locally provided…
Roundtable Round-up: Nurse Practitioner Candidate Emma Collins
The CRANAplus Nursing and Midwifery Roundtable discusses and reports on key issues affecting rural/remote health. Roundtable Member, Nurse Practitioner Candidate and Nurse Manager Emma Collins from…
Meet 2021 Collaborative Team Award Winners, the Midwifery Unit of the Coomealla Health Aboriginal Corporation
In the Far West region of New South Wales, Coomealla Health Aboriginal Corporation have been doing things differently. Midwife Debbie Towns discusses their innovative transition to a digital…
Meet 2021 Excellence in Research and/or Education Award Winner, Dr Kylie McCullough
Hear from Dr Kylie McCullough, lecturer at Edith Cowan University in Perth, on her early experiences in Kakadu, how they shaped her research interests, and how research into remote area nursing is…
Meet 2021 Excellence in Remote and Isolated Health Practice Award Winner, Helen Parker
Child Health Nurse with Mala'la Health Service, Helen Parker, has worked in Kenya, Saudi Arabia, and widely through the Top End. She reflects on becoming a nurse practitioner, a RAN's wide scope of…
Meet 2021 Aurora Award Winner, Terrie ‘Tess’ Ivanhoe
Tess Ivanhoe, Nurse Practitioner on the Chronic Disease Program at Nganampa Health Council, discusses how localised care can change health outcomes, the importance of understanding the community you…
Our new Acknowledgment of Country
Acknowledging Australia’s First Peoples is an obligation that CRANAplus embraces with deep commitment. Under the leadership of CRANAplus’ inaugural Executive Director of First Peoples’ Strategies,…
Just like the real thing: the new simulation tech changing how we learn
The more life-like a training scenario, the more meaningful the learning experience. CRANAplus constantly keeps abreast of the latest developments in simulation technology and a few recent…
Working through the bushfires: a psychologist’s experiences
Bush Support Line Manager Stephanie Cooper reflects on her experiences living and working on New South Wales’ south coast during the 2019/2020 bushfire season. As her story shows, even those with…
Eating well on the job: 9 nutrition tips
CRANAplus Senior Psychologist Nicole Jeffery-Dawes explains the connection between nutrition, gut health and wellbeing, and identifies nine ways to improve what you’re eating and drinking when…
Climate change and health
With a recent survey finding that more than half of the Australian health workforce are alarmed by how climate change is impacting health, CRANAplus is increasingly advocating for meaningful action.
Helping people become ‘health seekers’
Lesley Salem became Australia’s first Indigenous Nurse Practitioner 19 years ago. Now, she works in Doomadgee in Far North Western Queensland where the 2017-founded primary health care service is…
Student Story: From Katherine to Port Augusta
Kelly Ramsdale recollects the memorable moments from her professional experience placements – such as learning traditional weaving and the removal of a fist-sized carbuncle – and highlights the…
Student Story: Paramedicine, 750km from home
On the wide open plains of southwestern Queensland, hospitals and outside help may be far away. Nicolas Stanford reflects on his time as student paramedic on Charleville Station, the importance of…
Student Story: Lightening the Burden
Ballarat-based nursing student Molly Gladman’s four-week placement in Tennant Creek saw her gain experience in the general ward, midwifery clinic, renal dialysis unit, and GP clinic. Confronted by…
Fellow in Focus: Working for a fair and equitable society
Dr Scott Davis, a Fellow of CRANAplus, has worked in remote health for 30 years across the north of Australia and internationally, always with an eye on creating opportunities to support the…
CRANAplus People Power: Our three new Remote Clinical Educators
Meet Nicole Smith, Michelle Price and Leanne Laurie, three new CRANAplus Remote Clinical Educators who started in the last half of 2021. We discuss their backgrounds, what makes them tick, and the…
Facilitating courses is Ken’s passion
Ken Iles has participated in rescues following natural disasters, been a stand-by paramedic for your favourite reality TV show, and facilitated CRANAplus courses for 14 years. But it’s the remote…
Getting the #JabDone with Wuchopperen
Far North Queensland’s Wuchopperen Health Service discusses its unique engagement-focused approach to the COVID-19 vaccine roll-out, which includes community events, pop-up clinics and creating…
Meet the 2021 Gayle Woodford Scholarship Recipient
This year’s successful applicant for the Gayle Woodford Memorial Scholarship is Katie Yeomans, a proud Aboriginal Nurse of the Ngarigo Nation. A patient accumulator of the necessary experience, Ms…
Meet new CRANAplus Board Member, Naomi Zaro
At the CRANAplus Annual General Meeting in October, Naomi Zaro was voted in as the organisation’s newest Board Member. A proud Torres Strait Islander woman, Ms Zaro is eager to support the…
Occupational therapy in the Red Centre
Jordyn Iovino reflects on her clinical placement with Desert Therapy in Alice Springs and discusses how she has grown as a professional through increased cultural awareness.
Supporting farmers in remote Gippsland, Victoria
The Victorian Government announced funding for a Bush Nursing Pilot project this June. We catch up with Sarah Carr from Dargo Bush Nursing Centre to find out how the project is being implemented and…
Providing good preconception and antenatal care in rural and remote
Judy Burke has been working as the women’s and maternal health coordinator at Katherine West Health Board for the past two years.
Meet Deputy National Rural Health Commissioner, Adjunct Prof. Shelley Nowlan
Primary healthcare, women’s health, rural nursing, rural midwifery, and shining a light on nursing in the bush are key priorities set by the new Deputy National Rural Health Commissioner.
Vaccination – speak up loudly, reasonably and often
The awards just keep coming for Professor Sabina Knight, a key player in the creation of the Council of Remote Area Nurses of Australia (CRANA) back in 1983, the organisation that led to CRANAplus in…
From Cairns with love
Developing skills in the general medical ward and during home visits and experiencing Cairns by pushbike made this clinical placement away from her kids worthwhile for Nicola Dolan – and allowed her…
Health at great heights
Third-year nursing student Sarah Horn took to the air during her clinical placement at RFDS’ Meekatharra base. Despite the challenges of working at altitude and in intense heat, learning cultural and…
A welcome change of pace
Maigan Marrocco headed to Lake Grace in south-west WA to undertake her stage three nursing placement, with the financial assistance of a CRANAplus sponsored Undergraduate Remote Placement…
Fellow in focus: learning how to listen
Cross-cultural nursing, and certainly Remote Area Nursing (RAN), were basically unheard of in Australia when Registered Nurse Toni Dowd began practising in the late 1970s.
Facilitator spotlight: following in family footsteps
Catch up with Keppel Schafer, CRANAplus Facilitator since 2011. Keppel followed his grandmother’s steps into healthcare and is passionate about the transition from paper-based to digital…
You don’t know what you don’t know
Nurse Practitioner Lynette Byers, now in her third term on the CRANAplus Board, has seen many changes in the past nine years. Here she talks about her passion for education.
Fellow in Focus: Turning up at the coal face
Each edition of the magazine, we talk to a Fellow of CRANAplus, people who work tirelessly in their roles in rural and remote health and who we have recognised for their efforts. This month we…
A dream come true — eventually
CRANAplus facilitator Kathy Arthurs always wanted to be a nurse and to work for the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS). She studied nursing straight from school, in the days of hospital training. But…
My favourite placement
Physiotherapy graduate Georgina Haire discovered a silver lining when her final placement was interrupted by COVID-19 restrictions last year. Here’s her story.
Smitten by life in Esperance
Verity Lee, who studied at Edith Cowan University in Bunbury Western Australia, says her six-week placement in Esperance in WA was the perfect way to complete her Registered Nursing degree. Here’s…
Wonders and hurdles of rural midwifery
Mathilda (Tilley) Wilson, who completed her Bachelor of Midwifery at Charles Darwin University last year, summarises her final placement.
Fellow in Focus: Prepared to talk
Senior Mental Health Clinician, Sophie Heathcote, was in the first batch of Fellows of CRANAplus announced at the organisation’s conference in 2011. She has a long history with the organisation:…
The right direction for Emma
A chance meeting at a bus stop catapulted new CRANAplus Board member Emma Barritt from the world of academia into life as a remote area nurse in Indigenous communities in Outback Australia.
A priceless experience
Mental health nursing student Gabrielle Wilton recently travelled to Nhulunbuy and Groote Eylandt in East Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory
for her remote placement experience. Here’s her story.
Remote experience will open your eyes
Occupational Therapy student Natasha Clegg had no idea what to expect when she undertook a remote placement. Having completed it, she now believes everyone attaining an allied health degree should…
The Esperance experience
Emily Bean feels fortunate that she completed her nursing degree with a placement in Esperance in Western Australia. Here she outlines all the reasons why.
An experience to cherish
Occupational therapy student Elyse Krsanac at Curtin University says her placement at Alice Springs Hospital earlier this year “was easily the most rewarding experience of my life so far”.
Scholarships a financial boost during placements
The CRANAplus scholarships are a great boost to help relieve financial stress for recipients undergoing their placements says fnursing student Elise Thornwaite who is studying a Bachelor of Nursing…
Walking side by side
Decision time came 45 years ago for Nurse Practitioner Stephen Farrington when he met a young boy sitting with an old man carving a boomerang at Uluru. That decision was to spend his working life in…
Keeping Birthing on Country in the spotlight
Sue Kruske and Sue Kildea, midwives and leading university educators based in Alice Springs, are passionate about building knowledge of, and expanding services for Birthing on Country.
Having a whale of a time in the Great South West
CEO of Heywood Rural Health, Jackie Kelly swaps big city living for life on the beach.
In love with Alice
After completing a student placement in Central Australia, Registered Nurse Melissa Godden has returned to the Northern Territory to undertake a Graduate Nurse Program at Alice Springs Hospital. She…
Prepared for the challenges
A nursing background in trauma management, and working for 16 years in a remote hospital in his home land, Zimbabwe, prepared Freedom Zulu well for the challenges of working in Pormpuraaw Primary…
Play together, stay together
Mutton birding, Reiki healing and golf: these are just three of the varied activities on truwana/Cape Barren Island that are helping the locals follow their motto of “the community that plays…
First taste of remote nursing: from ICU to Ali Curung
Self-exposed ‘quintessential city slicker’ Charlotte Sumskas, a Critical Care Registered Nurse, recently went bush for a remote clinical placement. These are her thoughts, penned in the midst of her…
Maningrida to Manhattan
Registered Nurse Sue Ellen Kovack left her nomadic lifestyle as a remote area nurse in Australia for the Big Apple in November 2016. As she says, she went “from one extreme (in so many ways), to…
Barefoot Initiative — Lexi Keneally
We first met Lexi Keneally and family back in the March/Autumn 2013 Magazine. Here she catches us up on the amazing work being done by the Barefoot Initiative on the International stage.
A Paramedic Intern in the Northern Territory – A Personal Experience
‘Do you want a job as a paramedic in Darwin?’... ‘Yes please! Where do I sign?’ A few weeks after travelling to Darwin for an intensive 2-day interview process, Trent Ramsay received the above call…
Step out of your comfort zone
Being a student is the perfect time for stepping out of your comfort zone and taking new opportunities, says third year nursing student Lilly Sideris.
Multiple positive experiences in Indigenous Health
Indigenous health has always been a passion for Katarina Samotna, a 3rd Year Bachelor of Nursing student at Charles Darwin University. And her recent placement in the remote Indigenous communities of…
Anyone for an e‑Cuppa?
Marcia, Katrina and Leanne shared an ‘e-cuppa’ on Skype celebrating 12 months with the CRANAplus LINKS mentoring program.
Dental Student on Wheels
Traveling in the purpose-built dental van to provide services in aged care facilities in the Port Macquarie region was a highlight for Jessica Zachar, a Final Year Dentistry Student at Charles Sturt…
Cake to Cape
Four medical students from Dundee Scotland recently completed a fortnight’s placement in the remote Aboriginal community of Napranum on Cape York peninsula, 800kms north of Cairns.
Flexibility proves key on clinical placement
Connie Hierl, a 3rd year Bachelor of Nursing student at Griffith University in Southport, has discovered firsthand how nurses working in remote areas need to be flexible in an ever-changing…
Revelations at One Arm Point
3rd Year Bachelor of Nursing Student at Uni SA, Rory McGrath-Swan shares his story of 'a great opportunity'. A stint at One Arm Point, about 200 kilometres north of Broome on the Dampier Peninsula,…
Flying high and delving deep
Dianne Few shares insights into the diverse roles and locations that working as a remote area nurse has to offer.
What I would have missed
Ever considered going Remote? CRANAplus Member, Pam Wade felt the need for a sea-change. See her short story here.
Clinical skills pushed to the limits
For Angela Ramsay and Ely Taylor, two students from Canberra whose clinical nursing experience to date was bound to hospitals, “going remote” was both eye-opening and refreshing.
“Going South” to Antarctica
Dr Lloyd Fletcher, who spent 12 months in Antarctica as the Dr on Australia’s Davis Station, says he would recommend the experience of “going south” to anyone.
Palpable respect and pride
Libby Bowell, Director of Education for CRANAplus, says that the recent Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander (ATSI) health worker course in Cairns “pretty much confirms that my goal for the last…
Living the dream
A love for tiny little towns, isolated islands and the Aussie outback! Nancy has a passion for public health and improving living standards for those in far-flung corners of the world.