BY KATRINA BRANDON
SECOND-year medical students from Monash University travelled to Monash Rural Health to experience rural medicine first-hand.
During the week-long experience, the students observed general practice, received hospital-based clinical exposure and allied health clinical exposure.
Students also visited a farm, participated in various cultural activities, attended clinical skills sessions, and participated in Aboriginal health educational activities.
Clinical skills sessions, led by third-year students, taught the second-years how to insert cannulas, administer injections, and perform medical administration.
“The culture in medicine is teaching the years below you,” third-year student Arshida Amini said.
“I think that it is a great opportunity for year twos to see what life might be like if they are rural, and it might encourage a few of them to opt in to become rural (doctors or nurses) in the future.”
Ms Amini told the Express that the week gives second and third-year students a chance to get to know each other in the workplace, share their rural experiences and show their strengths. She also said that as a second-year student last year, she could participate in the same experience, from being taught by third-years to guiding first-years.
“Having this now prepares us to become people that can teach in the future,” she said.
“Teaching is a crucial part of being a medical professional. It carries us onto every year of our life as a medical professional. One day, I will probably have some medical students as well. I will look forward to teaching them.”
Second-year students Alexander Sarossy and Jessica Wang said that during the week, the country hospital seemed quieter than what they had seen in metro hospitals, providing better learning opportunities as they could observe.
“A lot of metro hospitals are really busy with sounds going off all of the time, people yelling, and people running around, and it’s quite a stressful environment to work in,” Mr Sarossy said.
“Often, it is difficult to study as well. I think an environment like this might be better for working and studying. You might see more, and you might gyet to be more involved.
“We have seen all of the theoretical stuff in class; we have learnt about anatomy and the mechanism behind how the body works, but it is very different learning that to seeing that and see how the people in the field really work.”
Ms Wang said that she really enjoyed the program, as it is guiding students into the shallow end of the medical world instead of dropping them straight into the industry during third-year placement. She said the experience over the week was a good introduction to picking out interests in working within a rural region to see what it is like to experience the different wards and positions.
“This is a really good start to how the next few years will work, and it is really good to see how the following years will unfold, observing in hospitals,” she said.
“I hope to understand better the different challenges and benefits of working, practising, and studying in rural areas – a more holistic understanding. We are very grateful to Latrobe Regional Hospital for allowing us to come here for the week; it has already been a really rewarding experience.”
“I think rural health is not really talked about in metro, which is a shame. Being a med student here is special because everyone feels like we are a part of a team where they are.”
