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[Mike Walters]

Good evening everybody

I have just had my membership on the forums activated so I thought I should pop in and introduce myself!

My name is Mike Walters, I am a UK trained RODP who moved out to Australia 3 years ago. Sadly, I suffered the same as many other ODP's in NSW and, despite registering with ASAPO and being given help and adive by Ray and the team, was refused employment at all of the local hospitals in Newcastle (where I live) as they would not recognise my qualification.
I eventually got some casual work at the local private hospital but they could not offer me a F/T position as I was not a nurse and they couldn't pay me any more than a wardsman rate.

I finally gave up and became a drug rep where I stayed until January this year. I had trained for my Cert IV in Training & Assessment in 2009 with a view to joining the L&D team in a pharmaceutical company.

In December last year I was offered a position as a healthcare educator with Integrated Care Management in Lambton, Newcastle.

Some of you may have put two and two together by now. I'm the voice on the other end of the phone or the signature at the bottom of the email when you enroll onto the Diploma of Paramedical Science (HLT50607)!

Initially I was focussing on the lower level technical quals like the Cert III in Health Services Assistance and Cert III in Health Support Services, but as from about 6 weeks ago I joined up with Gary (our Assessor and authority on the Diploma) to provide office & technical support for students studying with ICM.

As a result I am hoping to return to theatres in the near future to bring my competencies up-to-date and achieve the Diploma myself. I am fortunate that I kept all my paperwork from the UK and a couple of weeks ago a big plastic box containing around 4000 hours of logs and written assessments arrived on my doorstep (one heck of a Recognition of Prior Learning package ).

It is my honest hope that in the coming months Gary and I can develop the Diploma of Paramedical Science into a cutting-edge qualification that students will reslish the chance to study. And I guess that is where you guys come in... It's no good us sitting in the office trying to come up with new ways of training and assessing APO's on our own. I would like feedback from anyone and everyone on what you think should be done. I may well ask questions on the forum from time to time about the role and you can be sure that your answers will be helping to develop the qualifications that will shape the future of the profession.

Knowlege is power!

Cheers
Mike Walters
Educator | Healthcare
www.icm.org.au (PS, I'm going to rebuild this website in the next couple of weeks as well!)

[Nick.day]

Why do we not challenge this discrimanatory behavior in court. I am sorry but this is rediculous. We are trained to a higher level for three years to assist the anaesthetist. I am sick of being told that nurses are better than us and we are not trained properly or safe to practice. Generally speaking your average anaesthetic tech is much better than a nurse who dabbles. The only good anaesthetic nurses are the ones who work full time as anaesthetic assistants. In most cases, the least experienced nurse in theatre is given the role (really bloody safe for the patient) or agency staff (good luck if it is a difficult airway and you need equipment that your not familier with).
We can work together (NZ and UK). Australia just needs to get out of the dark ages and move forward like the rest of the world. We are all here for the wellbing of the patient (sorry not the exclusive domain of nurses).
If I have offended anyone, then good, pleases write in and share your views. Its time to get talking, and I can assure you that I will listen to all of your thoughts regardless of your background.

Nick Day

nick.day@rch.org.au

[Shane Guy]

Dear Nick,
The problem is regulation, technicians need to be regulated by a body and thats what we at ASAPO are trying to do but we are beating our heads up against a brick wall at the moment with the poor responce from a survey that pin points the amounts of technicians out there for a body to represent. We need these numbers to be accurate as I am sure that we have more that 120 technicians out there. We need unity and we need it now, I want every techncian who is reading this to drop what they are doing and go to the front page ASAPO website and fill in the survey, it honestly take about three minutes. For those of you who have filled in this survey, thank you and disregard the last sentence. I still have hospitals out there who have employed techncians without registration to a regulatory body and that is just not on, what happens if something goes wrong, who will support them?? ASAPO wants to be that support, so with the survey in hand and all the good work that ASAPO has done thus far, we can be that regulation body.
As for the nursing comments, its not nurses as a whole, its the individual practitioner, nurse, technician, ODP etc.. I have seen bad technicians as well as bad nurses but its up to them to make themselves better. Sure technicians have more training but cant get the jobs because a nurse with no experience will get the job due to the employing hospital only takes on nurses. Those nurses can better themselves by doing more course work which is happening, pushing technicians out further, thats why we need regulation... I want each technician who reads this to pass onto another five technicians to do the survey and get behind ASAPO, show your support and go to conferences, reply to anything on the bulletin board, answer the questions that I put out there, all this shows a united force.
Thank You
Shane Guy
ASAPO
Secretary