Video - What it's like to have a career up here in the Torres and Cape
Transcript
Healthcare worker Dayne: I think health in any community is very important, it doesn’t matter where you are or what culture you belong to. You know, we need to care for not only ourselves, but for each other.
Registered Nurse Ivy: The thing that I really love about working in the Torres and Cape is my interaction with the community members. Being able to know them on a professional and personal level.
Clinical Nurse Coordinator Guy: The journey to work is less than 10 seconds, so, that morning peak hour traffic you get to miss and it adds time that I can spend with my family.
Clinical Nurse Jess: The people are just so beautiful they’re genuinely good people. It's a safe place to live, it's a great place to bring up children.
Executive Director of Nursing Kim: We have thirty four facilities, we have four hospitals and we have thirty primary health care centres. Of those primary health care centres across the Cape and the Torres, a number of them are for very remote communities and they're such interesting places to live and work. And in those remote environments, clinicians have the capability and capacity to be enabled to work to their peak of their scope of practice.
Acting Nurse Unity Manager Anna: Being rural you get a lot more autonomy within your practice. You get an opportunity to develop your assessment skills, your clinical knowledge and sort of the scope that you can work in.
Senior Medical Officer Dr Amy Smidt: From going from a quite specialised service where there was lots of sub-specialists to having to provide care across a diversity of presentations and different kinds of medical conditions. So, that was a huge adjustment for me, but I felt really supported in that and actually really, really enjoyed the learning that comes with that.
Registered Nurse Tessa: So many unique opportunities here, I mean, the things that walk through the door, the autonomy that you have, you know, it's very much a you need to work with what you have. You know, you might not have everything that you'd have down south to maybe treat something or to provide to someone, but you need to be really skilled at finding what you have in the clinic and in the community resources and provide that good health care for them.
Northern Director of Medical Services Dr Jen Warden: So, your day could start off with taking a helicopter out to an outer island, flying over dugongs, flying over turtles, and then being able to land and just have a day out in the community, being able to really work with the primary care teams on the island to be able to provide really personalised service to the community as part of a multidisciplinary team.
Junior Medical Officer Dr Natalie Armstrong: You know your patients really well, they come back to you, so you have really good continuity of care and you can tell when they're sick because you've seen them when they're well.
Clinical Nurse Coordinator Guy: The community need to be able to have trust in you that you follow up and you’ll give them the advice that's going to help them be the best that they can.
Laura local Franzisha: I just bought this fruit for Guy and his team at the Laura clinic because they are doing such a great job.
Director of Primary Health Care Charlotte: In our communities in the north, where we have clinical nurse consultants, we have Indigenous health workers that work alongside with them, in the clinic and also outside in the community when we're doing home visits. This is to ensure that any clinical information that is passed down to our clients are understood by the clients.
Healthcare worker Phyllis: And we're here to help them and they are here to help us.
Clinical Midwife Hannah: And they keep us culturally appropriate in our care, which people don't know how to do until you've worked with First Nations people.
Assistant Director of Nursing Bernard: When I was new on to the island here at Mabuiag, I utilised my health centre manager and Norma. She was amazing and introduced me to some cultural mentors on the islands and just assimilating in becoming a part of the community in a culturally appropriate way, I then gained respect.
Registered Nurse Bella: In coming up here I’ve learnt so much about the culture and I've met so many family members and it's only been a year, so, I think it's the best decision I've ever made in my life.
Team Leader for Mental Health Sarah: Not everyone suited to remote, It can be hard work, you have to be flexible, you have to have a bit of sense of resilience and humour.
Clinical Nurse Jess: Within the first week of arriving I met my best friend, we just have the best life, we're actually not going to leaving here, it's so good.
Healthcare worker Dayne: That feeling we get from helping people in hey, that's probably the most rewarding part of our job.
Warraber Health Centre Manager Clara: People have come here and have never moved away. They've come here, they've married, they stayed here or they go and they always come back.
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