Building competencies and compassionate care in Timor-Leste

24 Oct 2016

24 October 2016

Several times a year, caregivers from St John of God Health Care Australian hospitals visit Timor-Leste on secondment. There they work with our NDP team, who are based in Timor long-term, to develop and roll out training packages that support Timorese nurses to achieve a number of critical competencies, including patient assessment.

Clinical Nurse Educator at St John of God Ballarat Hospital, Barry Flynn recently returned from his fifth secondment to Timor-Leste as team leader to deliver the second round of patient assessment training i.e. Module 2.

Patient assessment trainingAlso running the patient assessment training with Barry were Narelle McFarlane from St John of God Ballarat Hospital and Kathy Franklin from St John of God Geelong Hospital.  The trio worked closely with Timor-Leste based Caregiver, Project Officer, Joel Balan and the NDP team to implement the second phase of St John of God Health Care’s patient assessment education program.

Their objective was to work with the team of Timorese Nurse Educators, who are responsible for cascading training to nursing staff across the HNGV, to build on the patient assessment training that was delivered last year in Module 1. This included basic principles focused on the look, listen and feel approach.

The team revisited the key outtakes from Module 1 and built on the idea of patient-focused care and looking at the person, not just the condition being assessed. They also explored the importance of working with the people close to the patient who were affected by their illness, which often included the patient’s family.

Barry said that an important part of the training was working in small groups on the wards, using real life examples to create mini learning opportunities.

“We worked with the Nurse Educators to help them engage with their patients and their patients’ families in orderNurse educators at patient assessment training to explore and learn,” Barry said.

“We wanted to give them the chance to focus on a single, achievable problem and recognise their responsibility and the positive impact they could have through that one interaction.

“It was a very effective approach and we saw a lot of light bulb moments. It was also really rewarding for us on a personal and professional level to watch the Timorese nurses demonstrating such wonderful compassion, respect and empathy with their patients.”

Since returning to Australia, Barry, Narelle and Kathy have been delighted to learn that nurses across the HNGV have been embracing the patient assessment program and taking ownership of implementing it on their own wards.

Barry describes the opportunity to travel to Timor-Leste on secondment as life-changing experience.

“The work the Social Outreach International Health team is doing over there reminds me of the story of the Sisters and how they left Ireland to travel to an unknown land where they believed they could be of real service and make a difference to the local people,” Barry said.

“Travelling to Timor-Leste is such a privilege. It’s given me the opportunity to put our Mission into action and really made me appreciate all the things we often take for granted here in Australia.”

St John of God Health Care’s work in Timor-Leste is proudly supported by: