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PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT – finding hands-on, practical based, advanced level, short courses for professional development can be challenging. The training in “Medical Care on Board Ship” at St. Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney has proven to be very successful and not just for Seafarers. This course is based on the training of ambulance paramedics on shore that combines medical knowledge, practical skills and simulation training.

Participants complete a pre-course assignment by distance learning, with the face to face component being approximately 75 hours full time over two weeks. Much of the training consists of simulator exercises, at the Don Harrison Simulation Centre, St. Vincent’s Hospital, where participants are drilled in medical first aid emergency procedures for those that are hours away from help or days! In addition to the 75 hours participants are also placed on a 12 hour (day) shift with the NSW Ambulance Paramedics Service.

Therefore the focus is on critical cases. Learn topics such as Suturing techniques / Cannulation / Catheterisation / Administrating schedule drugs including schedule 8 / IV, IM, SC injection techniques / Care of dying or dead on board ship / Aspects of nursing – taking BP, BSL etc. / Role of Ships Medical Officer / ALS / Infection control and Aseptic techniques, just to name a few of the topics. The Simulation Centre at St Vincent’s Hospital is state of the art (see image).

Enjoy presentations by Industry leaders including St Vincent’s Hospital Trauma Director & Vascular Surgeon, Dr Tony Grabs.

The “Medical Care on Board Ship” qualification awarded is valid for 5 years and is approved by the Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA). The RTO is Maritime Studies of OTEN (Open Training and Education Network), part of TAFE NSW. The course is open to anyone requiring an AMSA approved Medical Care on Board Ship Certificate or persons interested in acquiring the knowledge and skills to manage a medical emergency in a remote location. The only prerequisite requirement is a current First Aid certificate as the course offers full training.

The course is naturally tailored for people who wish to be the master of a foreign going vessel to provide competency based training in emergency first aid and medical response in the shipboard environment. However whether you are a seafarer or not, it is beneficial if you are looking for something unique for your Professional Development. As a current Instructor on the course I undertook the full course myself and can highly recommended the diversity and practical aspects of the training – a great refresher.

Delivered full time in Sydney, offered triannually with the next date set for; 20th July – 30th July 2015 or choose; 6th October – 16th October 2015. The cost is $2,500.

Attached is the 'Medical Care on Board Ship Course' featured in the International Maritime Health Association newsletter. If you would like to find out further information, contact me and I will forward you the course coordinators details.

EMERGENCY+ SMARTPHONE APP – get the app that could save your life. In an emergency, when you’re under pressure and the adrenaline is running, it can be very hard to remember who to call, which numbers to dial and what your location is.

Australia’s Triple Zero Awareness Working Group has developed a smartphone app for iOS and Android devices helping people to call the right number at the right time, anywhere in Australia. The app is free of charge and available for download from iTunes and Google Play Stores.

The Emergency+ app uses a mobile phone's GPS functionality so callers can provide emergency call-takers with their location information as determined by their smart phone.

THE LIFE YOU SAVE MAY BE YOUR OWN.

TICK BITES AND MAMMALIAN MEAT ALLERGY - Australian allergic diseases physicians first described an association between tick bites and the development of mammalian meat (red meat) allergy and these findings have since been confirmed by researchers in the USA and in Europe.

Back in the year 2008, Associate Professor Sheryl van Nunen, an immunologist at Sydney's Royal North Shore Hospital, saw a small cluster of 25 patients who had been bitten by the Australian paralysis tick. Several months after the bite, suddenly out of the blue, they all had an allergic reaction to eating meat. Seventeen of the 25 patients had one or more serious symptoms of swelling of the tongue, constriction of the throat, difficulty in breathing plus an audible wheeze when they tried to breathe.

Surprisingly, none of them recorded a major allergic reaction to the original tick bite. Finally, after a lot of work, the immunologists seem to have worked out the cause of the meat allergy.

It starts with a not-very-sweet sugar called 'galactose'. We humans can eat it just fine. When you combine galactose with a sugar called glucose you get lactose — the sugar in breast milk. The trouble begins when you combine two galactose molecules together in a rather special way to make a bigger sugar commonly called alpha-gal. All mammals carry alpha-gal, except for humans and the higher primates. In fact, it turns out we can be allergic to it.

So here's a scenario; a bandicoot or another cute animal is playing happily somewhere on the east coast of Australia. The Australian paralysis tick bites it to get a meal of blood and some of the alpha-gal from the bandicoot gets into the gut of the tick. After a while, the tick feels hungry again and bites a human and some of that alpha-gal from the bandicoot gets transferred into the human.

Now, many Australians get bitten by ticks, but very few then go on to get the allergy to meat. So something happens in this human — we don't know what — and their immune system slowly cranks into action.

After a delay — somewhere between one and six months after the initial tick bite — they have another regular meal involving meat, but on this occasion they get an allergic reaction. In some cases they can die from a full-blown anaphylactic reaction unless they can get medical treatment in time.

This allergic meat reaction will be set off by pork, beef, lamb and even whale meat, but not by fish or chicken because they are not mammals. It can also be set off by some marshmallows if they contain beef gelatin.

Dr van Nunen sees about two cases each week of tick-caused meat allergy, and has over 500 patients with this condition on her books. In more ways than one these people could literally — and I do mean literally — die for a steak.

The focus of the following article by ‘The Australasian Society of Clinical Immunology and Allergy’ (ASCIA), is allergic reactions provoked by tick bites.

http://www.allergy.org.au/patients/insect-allergy-bites-and-stings/tick-allergy