As a reg­is­tered nurse, Eri­ca has already seen and expe­ri­enced a great deal. Start­ing her career in the emer­gency depart­ment of a met­ro­pol­i­tan area, she enjoyed the vari­ety of her work, where no two shifts were the same.

“I’m not one that enjoys ward-work­ing or rou­tine. I like some­thing dif­fer­ent and excit­ing where I don’t know what’s com­ing in the door.

So I moved to emer­gency, stud­ied, and stayed there, work­ing my way through all the roles. Then I thought, ​‘Now what do I do from here? I don’t think this is where I want to be the rest of my life,’” Eri­ca explained.

While remain­ing in the city, she held two roles in sex­u­al health, both of which she real­ly enjoyed. How­ev­er, she soon realised she was look­ing for a new way of life altogether.

“I quick­ly realised that com­mut­ing for a nine-to-five job in a metro area, catch­ing a bus for an hour to work every day, wasn’t the life I want­ed to continue.”

Eri­ca learnt upon an oppor­tu­ni­ty in Alice Springs. After inves­ti­gat­ing fur­ther and suc­cess­ful­ly mov­ing through the recruit­ment process, she embarked on a remote place­ment in Alice Springs, kick-start­ing her career in rur­al and remote health care.

“I went there, and I loved it. I loved the hos­pi­tal, work­ing in remote set­tings, the peo­ple, and the col­leagues. I realised at that stage, ​‘Wow, this is some­thing I could see myself doing — being in this remote set­ting and not know­ing what’s com­ing through the door again.’”

Since then, she’s had an 18-month jour­ney in agency nurs­ing in region­al and remote health­care set­tings, pri­mar­i­ly car­ing for Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties, which has tak­en her as far as the Tor­res Strait region.

Her next oppor­tu­ni­ty is set to take place in Doomadgee, Queens­land, lat­er this year, pri­mar­i­ly serv­ing an Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty locat­ed about 140 kilo­me­tres from the North­ern Ter­ri­to­ry border.

In dis­cussing the lessons of work­ing in region­al and remote com­mu­ni­ties so far, Eri­ca acknowl­edges that despite moments of frus­tra­tion, she’s had to change her mindset.

“I find that when I work in pre­dom­i­nant­ly Abo­rig­i­nal com­mu­ni­ties, it can be very frus­trat­ing because I want the best for the patients who walk through the door. How­ev­er, some­times what I believe is the best out­come for them isn’t what they per­ceive to be their best out­come. So I’ve had to adjust my think­ing quite sig­nif­i­cant­ly when enter­ing com­mu­ni­ties; it’s not about what I want as the health­care provider.”

When asked how she builds trust with­in com­mu­ni­ties, she admit­ted it’s tough and she is not always suc­cess­ful, giv­en her often short stays in any one health set­ting. Nev­er­the­less, her unwa­ver­ing ded­i­ca­tion dri­ves her to advo­cate for her patients and help them increase their health literacy.

“I try to encour­age my patients to under­stand that, even though I’m the health work­er, I’m work­ing in their best inter­ests. I often serve as the voice between the patient and the GP or the doc­tor on-site.

“I think that’s one of the most impor­tant strate­gies in build­ing trust with­in the com­mu­ni­ty – know­ing that I’m not just going to hand them a box of tablets with­out expla­na­tion. It’s my job to ensure they under­stand what we’re doing and why.”

The Gayle Wood­ford Memo­r­i­al Schol­ar­ship, spon­sored by CRANAplus and Flinders Uni­ver­si­ty Col­lege of Med­i­cine and Pub­lic Health, cov­ers the course fees for the Grad­u­ate Cer­tifi­cate in Remote Health Prac­tice offered through Flinders University.

Eri­ca express­es her desire to con­tin­ue the lega­cy of change that Gayle and oth­ers ini­ti­at­ed to improve health out­comes for peo­ple liv­ing in remote and region­al communities.

“At the gala din­ner, the love­ly lady next to me was in awe, and we dis­cussed Gayle and the lega­cy she left behind. For me, receiv­ing this schol­ar­ship means I want to hon­our her legacy.

“I hope that I can also bring change to com­mu­ni­ties – whether that’s today or tomor­row or in 10 years time – but I hope that by work­ing in com­mu­ni­ty just like Gayle did, you know I can make a dif­fer­ence to peo­ple liv­ing in remote and iso­lat­ed Australia.”

Although Eri­ca is only halfway through the Diplo­ma of Remote Health Prac­tice, it’s had an imme­di­ate impact on her work, espe­cial­ly with Abo­rig­i­nal and Tor­res Strait Islander people.

“Now that I’m study­ing this diplo­ma, I apply the social deter­mi­nants of health every time I walk into a room where I’m car­ing for someone.

“This course is pro­vid­ing me with so much more insight and com­pas­sion,” she says.

Next year, Eri­ca is set for an entire­ly new chal­lenge: she’ll be return­ing to Alice Springs to under­take a two-week inten­sive course on phar­ma­cother­a­peu­tics as part of the degree, which will enable her to admin­is­ter med­ica­tions in com­mu­ni­ties with­out a doc­tor or pharmacist.

“These skills are essen­tial, and I wouldn’t pos­sess them if I hadn’t pur­sued this degree,” Eri­ca states.

When asked about the most press­ing issues for First Peo­ples’ health, she ref­er­enced how impor­tant envi­ron­men­tal fac­tors are in influ­enc­ing health outcomes.

“There are so many social deter­mi­nants of health and if we addressed just one or two, such as hous­ing for exam­ple, we’d get sig­nif­i­cant­ly bet­ter health outcomes.”

When asked what advice she would give those con­sid­er­ing apply­ing for the schol­ar­ship, she encour­aged oth­ers not to hesitate.

“I pur­sued this oppor­tu­ni­ty because I dreamed of work­ing in remote areas and mak­ing a dif­fer­ence. If any­one shares that pas­sion and believes this schol­ar­ship could help, they should absolute­ly go for it.”

While Eri­ca doesn’t have a sin­gle men­tor, she finds inspi­ra­tion in those who have come before her.

“See­ing influ­en­tial fig­ures at the con­fer­ence, like Les­ley Woolf [CRANAplus 2024 Auro­ra Award recip­i­ent for Remote and Iso­lat­ed Health Pro­fes­sion­al of the Year] and Abo­rig­i­nal mid­wife Meli­na [Con­nors, First Nations Mid­wifery Direc­tor, Qld Health] inspires me.

“Their con­tri­bu­tions to the com­mu­ni­ty make me aspire to cre­ate a sim­i­lar impact one day.”

It’s evi­dent that Erica’s trans­for­ma­tive jour­ney is just begin­ning. When asked about her long-term goals, Eri­ca envi­sions estab­lish­ing per­ma­nent roots in a remote Aus­tralian com­mu­ni­ty to cre­ate last­ing impacts on indi­vid­u­als’ health outcomes. 

“I see my future in remote com­mu­ni­ties – not just as a con­tract nurse, but as some­one who has a home there, empow­er­ing the res­i­dents to take con­trol of their own health care.

“I guess that’s my goal: to be there and make a dif­fer­ence. Even if it’s just in one com­mu­ni­ty, I believe that would make a huge difference.” 

Erica’s atten­dance at the 2024 Remote Nurs­ing & Mid­wifery Con­fer­ence was spon­sored by her employ­er cmr | Cor­ner­stone Med­ical Recruit­ment.