When did you decide to become a rural GP, and why? 

I grew up in a cane farming family from the Burdekin and after studying medicine and completing a fellowship in Emergency Medicine with the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine, I realised that part of my soul needed to be re-connected with people from the bush. So, I applied for a job with the Royal Flying Doctor Service and soon found myself (crazily?) undertaking a second fellowship. I cannot fully explain how much it has saved me mentally and spiritually to reconnect with small towns and small town people (and do things like cuddle cute baby kangaroos – Q fever came to mind after the fact…). 

Where are you currently working? 

I work two days a week as a FACEM in Cairns Emergency and two days a week with the RFDS doing retrieval and now primary care clinics in Chillagoe. I’ve always said in emergency and retrieval it’s such a privilege to be with someone on the worst day of their life and try, using your professional expertise and human compassion to make that day just slightly better or at least bearable for them.  As a rural GP, you have the privilege of providing care before and beyond that day. I used to joke that as an emergency physician I only learnt how to look after people for 24 hours and after that... no idea!

Why do you think drug and alcohol addiction education (DAAE) is important? 

Each community has its own struggles and I recognise that people and communities can’t be pigeon-holed or judged for their behaviours relating to drug and alcohol addiction. We all have our own story! Considering my addiction is chewing gum, I imagine I would be perceived by most patients as naïve or a square. It’s easy to inadvertently make people with addiction feel patronised or judged which can be so destructive to a therapeutic relationship. I hope that ACRRM’s DAAE program and working in Emergency has given me a bit of a better understanding of where people are coming from.

What takeaways have you had following completion of the ACRRM DAAE Program and how will you apply these takeaways to your current role? 

The DAAE program has taught me more about harm minimisation. I give a talk to the Grade 12s at our local school each year and tell them stories about friends, family and patients that I have known who have suffered injury or died from intoxication or drug use. They also get the opportunity with the P.A.R.T.Y program to come to the hospital and run through a simulation in which they have to resuscitate a drunk driver who dies in a car accident. It’s pretty sobering for them (mind the pun) to experience the tragedy of alcohol and drug related trauma from the perspective of a health care worker.

It surprises me that in each cohort one of the students will say something like ‘we are going to take drugs anyway, so just tell us how we can do it safely’. This is a very hard question to answer. I used to think these young people were so entitled that they wanted the right to choose to take drugs, and the right to be cared for when it all went bad! Now I realise that drugs are an inevitable part of some people’s lives (unfortunately) and for those that no longer have a choice, there are things that can be done to reduce the risk to themselves and others. At the end of the session I tell the students half serious that I hope I never see them again (in Emergency that is).

Would you recommend the ACRRM DAAE Course to your colleagues? 

I would recommend the DAAE course to colleagues as it helped consolidate my knowledge and equipped me with a better understanding of external resources that are at my disposal to help patients. The online format is always a pleasure as it’s like a sticker chart that gives you a little tick each time you finish a module till the course is complete.