Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Effect Of Simulation Training On The Practice Of Medical Students, Natalie A. Smith, Elfi Ashcroft, Kathryn Rhodes

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

One of the remaining challenges in simulation-based medical education (SBME) is to show that it has a positive impact on clinical outcome (1). We report an investigation of simulation teaching in medical students using self-reported measures of change in practice as a surrogate measure of clinical impact. We describe reasons given by students for increased clinical confidence and the key points that they learned from SBME.

Improving Medical Students' Research Capacity Through Community-Based Projects, Peter L. Mclennan, Judy Mullan, Kathryn M. Weston, Kylie J. Mansfield, Warren C. Rich

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

No abstract provided.

Porcine Bladder Urothelial, Myofibroblast And Detrusor Muscle Cells: Characterisation And Atp Release, Ying Cheng, Kylie J. Mansfield, Shaun L. Sandow, Prajni Sadananda, Elizabeth Burcher, Kate H. Moore

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

ATP is released from the bladder mucosa in response to stretch, but the cell types responsible are unclear. Our aim was to isolate and characterize individual populations of urothelial, myofibroblast, and detrusor muscle cells in culture, and to examine agonist-stimulated ATP release. Using female pig bladders, urothelial cells were isolated from bladder mucosa following trypsin-digestion of the luminal surface. The underlying myofibroblast layer was dissected, minced, digested, and cultured until confluent (10–14 days). A similar protocol was used for muscle cells. Cultures were used for immunocytochemical staining and/or ATP release investigations. In urothelial cultures, immunoreactivity was present for the cytokeratin …

Immunocytochemical Characterisation Of Cultures Of Human Bladder Mucosal Cells, Jacqueline R. Woodman, Kylie J. Mansfield, Vittoria A. Lazzaro, William Lynch, Elizabeth Burcher, Kate H. Moore

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Background: The functional role of the bladder urothelium has been the focus of much recent research. The bladder mucosa contains two significant cell types: urothelial cells that line the bladder lumen and suburothelial interstitial cells or myofibroblasts. The aims of this study were to culture these cell populations from human bladder biopsies and to perform immunocytochemical characterisation.

Methods: Primary cell cultures were established from human bladder biopsies (n = 10). Individual populations of urothelial and myofibroblast-like cells were isolated using magnetic activated cell separation (MACS). Cells were slow growing, needing 3 to 5 weeks to attain confluence.

Results …

Big Fish In A Big Pond: A Study Of Academic Self Concept In First Year Medical Students, Kirsty Jackman, Ian G. Wilson, Marjorie Seaton, Rhonda G. Craven

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Background: Big-fish-little-pond effect (BFLPE) research has demonstrated that students in high-ability environments have lower academic self-concepts than equally able students in low-ability settings. Research has shown low academic self-concepts to be associated with negative educational outcomes. Social comparison processes have been implicated as fundamental to the BFLPE. Methods: Twenty first-year students in an Australian medical school completed a survey that included academic self-concept and social comparison measures, before and after their first written assessments. Focus groups were also conducted with a separate group of students to explore students’ perceptions of competence, the medical school environment, and social comparison processes. Results: …

Factors Influencing General Practitioner Referral Patterns To Orthopaedic Surgeons In The Australian Health Care Setting: An On-Line Survey, David Loxton, Stephen Barnett, Patricia J. Knight, Andrew D. Bonney

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Aim:

To use the member database of e-healthspace.com.au to identify and quantify the factors that influence General Practitioners when referring patients to a particular Orthopaedic Surgeon

Method:

On line Survey of 9495 General practitioners who are registered on www.ehealthspace.com.au Seven point Likert scale used to rank responses from extremely positive to extremely negative to various factors that influence decisions to refer patients to an Orthopaedic Surgeon

Questions: 5 Broad Categories

Professional and personal reputation / Communication / Style of practice / Promotional activities / Access and cost

Results:

476 respondents.

407 proceeded beyond the demographic questions.

Demographic Questions:

Practice location …

General Practice Training, Web 2.0 And Virtual Communities Of Practice: An Interview Study, Stephen Barnett, Sandra C. Jones, Lance R. Barrie, Andrew D. Bonney, Donald C. Iverson

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Aims and Rationale

General Practice training faces geographic barriers to efficient knowledge sharing, collaboration and professional and social support amongst its participants. In industry, large companies use internet tools to create Virtual Communities of Practice which improve collaboration, information sharing and support amongst staff. This study examined the feasibility of using Web 2.0 tools to create a Virtual Community of Practice for GP training.

Methods

Following a previous quantitative survey study, a qualitative telephone interview study was undertaken with GP Registrars and Supervisors in a Regional Training Provider. Participants were selected on the basis of highest internet usage in the …

Different Needs, Same Solution: The Effect Of Visible Supervision On Older Patients' Attitudes To General Practice Trainee Chronic/Complex Care, Andrew D. Bonney, Sandra C. Jones, Donald Iverson, Christopher Magee

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Abstract presented at The 2010 38th NAPCRG Annual Meeting, 13-17 Nov 2010, Seattle, USA

General Practice Training, Web 2.0 And Virtual Communities Of Practice : A Survey Study, Stephen Barnett, Sandra C. Jones, Lance R. Barrie, Andrew D. Bonney, D C. Iverson

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Aims & rationale/Objectives

General Practice training faces geographic barriers to efficient knowledge sharing, collaboration and professional and social support amongst its participants. In industry, large companies use internet tools to create Virtual Communities of Practice which improve collaboration, information sharing and support amongst staff. This study examined the feasibility of using Web 2.0 tools to create a Virtual Community of Practice for GP training.

Methods

A crossectional online survey was conducted in a Regional GP Training Provider (RTP). The instrument contained categorical and 5-point ascending Likert response format items and was sent to all registrars and supervisors in the RTP. …

Australian Medical Students' Perceptions Of Professionalism And Ethics In Medical Television Programs, Roslyn Weaver, Ian G. Wilson

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Background: Medical television programs offer students fictional representations of their chosen career. This study aimed to discover undergraduate medical students’ viewing of medical television programs and students’ perceptions of professionalism, ethics, realism and role models in the programs. The purpose was to consider implications for teaching strategies. Methods: A medical television survey was administered to 386 undergraduate medical students across Years 1 to 4 at a university in New South Wales, Australia. The survey collected data on demographics, year of course, viewing of medical television programs, perception of programs’ realism, depiction of ethics, professionalism and role models. Results: The shows …

Sound Assessment Of A Role For Fish Oil In Therapeutics Or Prevention Of Cardiovascular Disease Jeopardised By Confused Study Design, Peter L. Mclennan

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

The study by Galan and colleagues in the SU.FOL.OM3 collaborative group has added further confusion to the omega-3 story, which in this case largely derives from confusion in the study design. Confusion about the likely mechanism of cardiovascular protection and hence expected outcomes; confusion in the subject selection; confusion about the timing of intervention; confusion about the active components of fish oil.

Training Our Future Doctors To Deliver Public Health Education, Helen Rienits

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Delivering health education is, as we all know, done for the purpose of trying to encourage people, either individually or as a community, to change their behaviour with the intention of improving their health and well being and preventing certain lifestyle caused illnesses. We would all admit that changing behaviour is difficult and it often takes repeated health messages and much encouragement to effect behavioural change in a person or community. With the aging population and rise in preventable illnesses in our communities, health education has become the responsibility of all health professionals in all forms of contact with individuals …

Circulating Osteopontin: A Dual Marker Of Bone Destruction And Angiogenesis In Patients With Multiple Myeloma, Aikaterini Sfiridaki, Spiros Miyakis, Constantina Pappa, George Tsirakis, Athanasios Alegakis, Vasilios Kotsis, Efstathios Stathopoulos, Michael Alexandrakis

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

The matrix protein osteopontin has been shown to be a marker of osteoclastic activity in multiple myeloma patients, as well as a regulator of angiogenesis. We measured serum levels of osteopontin in 50 untreated multiple myeloma patients (in 25, also after treatment) and examined the relation to markers of osteolytic and angiogenic activity. The median (range) of serum osteopontin was 85 (5-232) in the patient group vs. 36 (2-190) ng/ml in the control group. Serum osteopontin levels were significantly higher in patients with advanced stage or grade of myeloma disease. All patients with serum osteopontin levels >100 ng/ml had advanced …

Psychosocial And Biological Factors Contributing To Body Weight Gain In Schizophrenia, Nagesh B. Pai, Shae-Leigh C. Vella

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Overweight and obesity are frequently reported to be a significant issue in schizophrenia resulting in the inherent complications of these disorders. Body weight gain also commonly results from treatment with the most tolerable and efficacious pharmacological treatments, second-generation antipsychotics. However there are numerous other factors that contribute to increased body mass in individuals with schizophrenia prior to the initiation of treatment. With prior research indicating that individuals with schizophrenia have higher rates of overweight and obesity before treatment. Therefore this article provides a review of pertinent issues associated with body weight gain in schizophrenia in an attempt to delineate the …

Determining Level Of Care Appropriateness In The Patient Journey From Acute Care To Rehabilitation, C. Poulos, Christopher A. Magee, Guy M. Bashford, Kathy Eagar

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Background: The selection of patients for rehabilitation, and the timing of transfer from acute care, are important clinical decisions that impact on care quality and patient flow. This paper reports utilization review data on inpatients in acute care with stroke, hip fracture or elective joint replacement, and other inpatients referred for rehabilitation. It examines reasons why acute level of care criteria are not met and explores differences in decision making between acute care and rehabilitation teams around patient appropriateness and readiness for transfer.
Methods: Cohort study of patients in a large acute referral hospital in Australia followed with …

A Spiral Curriculum For Teaching Resuscitation: The What, The Why, The How, K Rhodes, E M. Ashcroft

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Background: More than fifty years ago, Jerome Bruner introduced the spiral curriculum based on constructivist ideas. Most fields of education adopted this concept which promises to enable the learner to develop their ability to transfer thinking processes from one context to another - also an essential skill for a medical doctor. Aim: By implementing the spiral curriculum model throughout our course, we aim to not only accelerate our students' learning, we also seek to better prepare them to master situations that arise infrequently or urgently, such as the need for life support skills. Method: Based on the our MBBS entry …

Alert But Less Alarmed: A Pooled Analysis Of Terrorism Threat Perception In Australia, Garry Stevens, Kingsley Agho, Melanie Taylor, Alison L. Jones, Jennifer Jacobs, Margo Barr, Beverley Raphael

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Background: Previous Australian research has highlighted disparities in community perceptions of the threat posed by terrorism. A study with a large sample size is needed to examine reported concerns and anticipated responses of community sub-groups and to determine their consistency with existing Australian and international findings. Methods: Representative samples of New South Wales (NSW) adults completed terrorism perception questions as part of computer assisted telephone interviews (CATI) in 2007 (N = 2081) and 2010 (N = 2038). Responses were weighted against the NSW population. Data sets from the two surveys were pooled and multivariate multilevel analyses conducted to identify health …

Engaging Rural Preceptors In New Longitudinal Community Clerkships During Workforce Shortage: A Qualitative Study, Judith N. Hudson, Kathryn M. Weston, Elizabeth Farmer

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Background: In keeping with its mission to produce doctors for rural and regional Australia, the University of Wollongong, Graduate School of Medicine has established an innovative model of clinical education. This includes a 12-month integrated community-based clerkship in a regional or rural setting, offering senior students longitudinal participation in a 'community of practice' with access to continuity of patient care experiences, continuity of supervision and curriculum, and individualised personal and professional development. This required developing new teaching sites, based on attracting preceptors and providing them with educational and physical infrastructure. A major challenge was severe health workforce shortages. Methods: Before …

The Life Of A ‘Digital Native’, Linda Corrin, Sue Bennett, Lori Lockyer

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

There have been many claims about the characteristics of the new generation of ‘digital native’ students participating in higher education. The lack of empirical evidence upon which many of these early claims were based has been highlighted in a number of studies investigating students’ technology ownership. However, very few studies to date have explored in detail students’ day-to-day interactions with technology and the impact on their academic studies. In the current project multiple case studies were compiled to provide an in-depth exploration of technology use across university students’ everyday life and academic study contexts. This paper reports on one of …

Trajectories Of Depression And Their Relationship With Health Status And Social Service Use, Chun-Min Chen, Judy Mullan, David Griffiths, Irene A. Kreis, Tzuo-Yun Lan, Herng-Chia Chiu

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

This longitudinal study was conducted between 1994 and 2004 in a cohort of Southern Taiwan community-living elderly residents. The study aims to explore the trajectories of depression and how these patterns differed between respondents who survived and those who died during data collection phases; this study also investigated how health status change and health/social service use predicted the different trajectories of depression. Eight hundred and ten participants had completed all six waves of the survey or were followed-up at each wave until death in the prospective study in Kaohsiung City. Depressive symptoms were evaluated by the Short Psychiatric Evaluation Schedule …

Challenges Of Older Patients’ Knowledge About Warfarin Therapy, Sayeed Nasser, Judy Mullan, Beata Bajorek

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Objective: To review the challenges of warfarin education for older patients (aged 65 years or older) in terms of knowledge, access to warfarin education, and education resources. Methods: A quasi-systematic review of the literature was performed via electronic database searches (eg, Medline, Embase, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, International Pharmaceutical Abstracts, Meditext, and Google Scholar) from 1990 to May 2011. Results: The 62 articles reviewed found that improved patient knowledge results in better anticoagulation control. The review also found that between 50% and 80% of older patients have inadequate knowledge about the basic aspects of warfarin therapy …

What Do Older Patients Want? Understanding Older Patients' Attitudes Towards General Practice Trainees, Andrew D. Bonney, Sandra C. Jones, Donald Iverson, Christopher Magee

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Context: Older patients constitute an increasing proportion of the caseloads in general practice (GP) training practices, but are relatively reluctant to consult trainees. Understanding their attitudes is a first step in improving older patient-trainee interaction. Objectives: Characterise the attitudes of older patients to GP trainees. Design: Cross-sectional survey; exploratory factor analysis; logistic regression. Setting: Randomised, stratified sample of 38 training practices across five Australian states. Participants: Patients aged 60 years and over (N=911; response rate 47.9%). Instrument: Questionnaire for self-completion: previously piloted and subjected to factor analysis. Main and secondary outcome measures: Identification of attitude factors; patient characteristics predicting high …

Measuring Older Patients’ Attitudes To General Practice Registrars: Exploratory Factor Analysis Of A Survey Instrument, Andrew D. Bonney, Christopher A. Magee, Peter Caputi

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

Introduction: Training general practice registrars (GPRs) to meet the challenges of an ageing population is hampered by their relatively reduced contact with older patients and a paucity of suitable research to inform training models. This paper describes an exploratory factor analysis of a survey instrument assessing the attitudes of older patients to GPRs, as part of a project to address these concerns. Methods: The instrument was developed on the basis of a qualitative study and a literature review and distributed to 500 patients aged 60 years and over from 10 training practices in regional Australia. Responses to 22 of the …

The Effect Of A Brief Family Intervention On Primary Carer's Functioning And Their Schizophrenic Relatives Levels Of Psychopathology In India, Virupaksha Devaramane, Nagesh B. Pai, Shae-Leigh Vella

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

This study examined the short term effects of a brief familial intervention on schizophrenic the patient’s levels of psychopathology and their primary caregiver’s functioning in India. Caregiver functioning was measured by the caregiver’s levels of burden and coping along with the patient’s perceived level of expressed emotion (EE). The participants were 18 schizophrenic patients and their related primary carer from a medical facility in India. The patients’ levels of psychopathology and EE were assessed at baseline and at completion of the study with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS; Kay et al., 1987) and the Family Emotional Involvement And …

An Osce Clinical Log Station: Driving Reflection On Clinical Competence Development, J N. Hudson, Helen Rienits

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

An OSCE clinical log station: driving reflection on clinical competence development Hudson JN, Rienits H, Graduate School of Medicine, University of Wollongong Background: An electronic clinical log was introduced at an Australian 4-year graduate entry medical school with the first intake of students in 2007. While some students embraced this log to record and reflect on their early clinical experiences, initial uptake of the log was low. Among the strategies used to encourage student use of this learning resource was the introduction of an innovative clinical log OSCE station. What was done: The clinical log station aimed to foster longitudinal …

Do Doctors Have A Role In Public Health Education, Helen Rienits

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

A study of people’s attitudes and responses to the presentation of health education by a doctor.

Warfarin-Specific Medication Charts- Do They Have A Place In Aged Care Facilities?, Judy Mullan, Margaret Jordan, Victoria Traynor

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

No abstract provided.

Evaluating The Implementation Of A Warfarin Specific Medication Chart In Residential Aged Care Facilities, Margaret Jordan, Judy Mullan, Victoria Traynor

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

The possibility of a warfarin-specific medication chart that could serve as a prescription, monitoring and administration record for residents in aged care facilities evolved from a previous study conducted by the research team. The aim of this pilot study was to develop and trial the implementation of a warfarin specific medication chart in residential aged care facilities (RACFs).

Exploring Medical Students’ Use Of Technology, Linda Corrin

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

The use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are increasingly important in the delivery of medical education. Whilst the primary motivation for technology integration is to increase learning and teaching effectiveness, such decisions are sometimes based on assumptions of a high level of technological literacy of students entering higher education. Recent literature has challenged these assumptions instead presenting a more diverse picture of students’ experience and skill with technology (Kennedy et. al., 2007, Oliver & Goerke, 2007; Margaryan, Littlejohn & Vojt, 2011). This paper presents the results of surveys conducted with new graduate medical students designed to measure access to …

Tai Chi For Stress Management And Well-Being In Medical Students, Susan J. Thomas, Teresa M. Treweek, Elizabeth Farmer, John A. Bushnell

Graduate School of Medicine - Papers (Archive)

No abstract provided.