Recog­nis­ing the need to bet­ter pre­pare nurs­es head­ing into rur­al and remote posts, Phill, cur­rent­ly employed as Remote Area Educator/​Mentor, devel­oped a Tran­si­tion to Remote Prac­tice Pro­gram with Kather­ine West Health Board.

He says the organ­i­sa­tion acknowl­edges that not every­one is suit­ed to the RAN role and a three-month pro­gram allows par­tic­i­pants to deter­mine if they are inter­est­ed in a longer-term career as a RAN. The pro­gram has proved very suc­cess­ful, with an over­whelm­ing num­ber of appli­cants and a high reten­tion rate of nurs­es who have participated.

“Unlike tra­di­tion­al place­ments, which can last 12 – 24 months, we offer a three-month pro­gram,” says Phill. 

“This flex­i­bil­i­ty allows nurs­es to expe­ri­ence remote work before com­mit­ting long-term.”

Phill has fine-tuned the pro­gramme over time to pro­vide essen­tial train­ing to equip nurs­es with the skills and con­fi­dence they need and is keen to share his ideas with the Roundtable.

Phill’s pas­sion for prepar­ing nurs­es for remote post­ing has its roots in his own first expe­ri­ence 30 years ago.

“My first remote post over 30 years ago was a shock,” he says. 

“Tran­si­tion­ing from a met­ro­pol­i­tan hos­pi­tal to a sin­gle-nurse post was a steep learn­ing curve, I was entire­ly unpre­pared and still not sure what I was think­ing tak­ing such a mas­sive career leap.”

“Thank­ful­ly, times have changed and there is much more sup­port and resources for nurs­es who want to take the next step in becom­ing a RAN today.”

“The two-week prepa­ra­tion peri­od before nurs­es take up their remote post­ings with the Kather­ine West Health Board includes skills and prac­tice that are rel­e­vant to the role, for exam­ple ear health, health assess­ment and chron­ic dis­ease man­age­ment, sutur­ing, plas­ter­ing, domes­tic vio­lence, social deter­mi­nants of health and ambu­lance oper­a­tion. The pro­gramme also includes many aspects of pri­ma­ry health care and focus­es on pro­vid­ing cul­tur­al­ly appro­pri­ate care in our organisation.

“Remote nurs­ing involves acute care, and the course recog­nis­es that nurs­es in remote areas can find them­selves in sit­u­a­tions beyond their nor­mal scope of practice.

“The Nation­al Rur­al and Remote Nurs­ing Gen­er­al­ist Frame­work 2023 – 2027 was a key doc­u­ment in putting the pro­gram togeth­er,” says Phill.

Pre­sen­ta­tions for par­tic­i­pants dur­ing the two-week course also cov­er ser­vices offered by Kather­ine West Health Board, such as Tack­ling Indige­nous Smok­ing; Strong Begin­nings for Strong Fam­i­lies which pro­vides infor­ma­tion and sup­port around grow­ing healthy babies; and Safe Fam­i­lies and Safe Com­mu­ni­ties, which rais­es aware­ness about respect­ful rela­tion­ships, pos­i­tive par­ent­ing and access to domes­tic and fam­i­ly vio­lence services.

Phill’s jour­ney into nurs­ing began with an inter­est in St John’s Ambu­lance Ser­vice and first aid. ​“Ini­tial­ly, I intend­ed to try nurs­ing for a year or two,” he says. 

“That was 35 years ago.”

A prac­tis­ing nurse and mid­wife, Phill has a keen inter­est in pro­vid­ing remote nurs­es with mater­ni­ty skills that extend beyond deal­ing with emer­gency sit­u­a­tions and unex­pect­ed births.

The PRAMS (Pri­ma­ry Remote Area Mater­ni­ty Skills) sec­tion of the tran­si­tion pro­gramme pro­vides train­ing for nurs­es in sit­u­a­tions with­out direct access to a GP or midwife.

“We acknowl­edge that GP or Mid­wifery care is defin­i­tive care but unfor­tu­nate­ly that is not always avail­able,” says Phill. 

“We show nurs­es how to trans­late their exist­ing skills so they can pro­vide basic screen­ing and edu­ca­tion and pro­vide feed­back to our GPs and mid­wives in the organ­i­sa­tion. We are aim­ing to have ear­ly and reg­u­lar ante­na­tal care and ensure ear­ly detec­tion of poten­tial preg­nan­cy-relat­ed complications.”

Phill, whose diverse roles over the years have ranged from sin­gle-nurse posts to mul­ti-RN teams span­ning both pub­lic and pri­vate sec­tors, says his goal with the Round­table is to con­tribute strate­gic insights and man­age­ment to bet­ter pre­pare and main­tain the RAN workforce. 

“I am look­ing for­ward to the oppor­tu­ni­ty to net­work beyond the North­ern Ter­ri­to­ry and con­tribute to pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment on a nation­al scale,” he says. 

“Hav­ing a rep­re­sen­ta­tive from each state ensures a diverse range of per­spec­tives, and I am eager to bring and take new, inno­v­a­tive ideas to the table.

“This Round­table pro­vides an ide­al plat­form to address chal­lenges in rur­al and remote health care and enhance our col­lec­tive approach to nurs­ing and mid­wifery in remote areas.”