In 2022, with the Vic­to­ri­an Gov­ern­ment announc­ing free nurs­ing degrees short­ly after the pass­ing of my dad, who had strug­gled with the lack of male nurs­es and some of the aspects of per­son­al care, I made an enquiry to La Trobe Uni­ver­si­ty Mil­du­ra Cam­pus about what was involved with study­ing nursing. 

There were a num­ber of fac­tors that influ­enced my deci­sion for a career change from build­ing sur­vey­ing and envi­ron­men­tal health, among these was an inter­est in work­ing in remote areas of Aus­tralia. I had worked in out­back com­mu­ni­ties before, and when I trav­elled out to those areas I liked the scenery, the big sky, the peo­ple – and work­ing with those people.

Once I com­menced study, I did a search of remote area nurs­ing in Aus­tralia and one of the first results that came up was CRANAplus. 

On phon­ing CRANAplus, I spoke with Melanie Avion, Pro­fes­sion­al Offi­cer. Melanie advised me on steps to take and what expe­ri­ence I should look at to build a sus­tain­able remote area nurs­ing career. 

This includ­ed expe­ri­ence in acute, emer­gency and com­mu­ni­ty nurs­ing, as well as look­ing at tran­si­tion pro­grams that the var­i­ous states have.

Melanie also sug­gest­ed that I con­tact the Cen­tre for Remote Health in Alice Springs to dis­cuss under­grad­u­ate schol­ar­ship oppor­tu­ni­ties for placement.

La Trobe Uni­ver­si­ty has a part­ner­ship with Flinders Uni­ver­si­ty for place­ment at Alice Springs and I was suc­cess­ful in obtain­ing a three-week place­ment there for my ​‘Nurs­ing the Dete­ri­o­rat­ing Patient’ subject.

Whilst there, I sought advice from the Cen­tre for Remote Health about remote area nurs­ing and also met with nurse edu­ca­tors from Cen­tral Aus­tralia Abo­rig­i­nal Congress.

When it came time to apply for my grad­u­ate year, I was offered posi­tions in Mil­du­ra, North­ern Ter­ri­to­ry, and Cairns. After dis­cus­sions with the var­i­ous health ser­vices, the oppor­tu­ni­ty at Ten­nant Creek in the NT made the most sense for a view of look­ing at remote area nursing.

I made the two-and-a-half-day trip from Mil­du­ra to Ten­nant Creek and com­menced work in the acute 20-bed main ward of the hos­pi­tal, which offers a good scope of prac­tice and learn­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties. After this year, I will com­mence study­ing the Grad­u­ate Diplo­ma in Remote Area Nurs­ing, as well as do short cours­es through CRANAplus.

I sug­gest any­body inter­est­ed in a grad­u­ate year in a remote area speak to the CRANAplus team, to the nurse edu­ca­tor where you apply for a grad year, and to the clin­i­cal learning/​education team in the rel­e­vant state to get an under­stand­ing and assur­ance of train­ing, ori­en­ta­tion, super­nu­mer­ary days and learn­ing pro­grams you will have.

Hav­ing that ini­tial infor­ma­tion from CRANAplus set me on the right path­way, it was fan­tas­tic. Know­ing where to go, instead of look­ing around in cir­cles, was real­ly beneficial.

Being a CRANAplus Mem­ber gives you an idea that, if you go out remote, there are resources you can tap into. You get a feel for what peo­ple expe­ri­ence on the ground, and what sup­port CRANAplus offers. It’s very good from that aspect.