The CREM team has received funds from the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine to develop an inter-professional short course focussed on the management of trauma patients in rural areas.  Although rural and metropolitan clinicians may be required to manage similar patient presentations, rural practice presents unique challenges related to resourcing and clinical exposure not often encountered by medical professionals working in larger towns and cities.  In rural areas, there is a higher likelihood of nurses, GPs or paramedics working in isolation and being required to manage critical patients with fewer resources.  With this in mind, we think there is a great advantage in bringing together clinicians from different backgrounds and providing them with the opportunity to learn from, with and about each other.  Often, the difference between a case that is managed well and one where multiple errors occur is the way in which the team interacts.  The way in which a team interacts is often dependent on the background, experience and attitude of each person in that team.  By developing a short course based on the principles of inter-professional education, our aim is provide rural clinicians with the tools to adapt to, contribute to, and lead within multi-disciplinary teams.

We aim to run a pilot course in November 2016 in order to refine the facilitation and debriefing skills of the CREM teaching staff, and to run the first course in January 2017.  The course format will include an online component and 2 day workshop utilising team training activities and patient scenarios using high-fidelity simulation.  Scenarios will include pre-hospital and in-hospital cases providing participants with the opportunity to develop patient management skills in an environment they may be unfamiliar with.