The Intensive Care Unit is a 24 bed Tertiary Intensive Care Facility, which is split into two pods, North and South. We have a strong focus on teaching with regular teaching sessions.
We have Registrars rotating from the Emergency, Anaesthesia and Medical sub specialties, for 6-12 month periods. Registrars will generally fall into two levels; Senior Registrar & Basic Trainee Registrar.
Intensive Care currently has 19 Registrars, 10 Specialists and 1 Medical Officer.
Nursing currently has over 120 Registered Nurses, with two full time Nurse Educators employed within the Department of Intensive Care.
Table of Contents
1. Registrar Orientation:
First week that new Registrars start with the Department. This consists of two full days dealing with:
- Documentation
- Roles of various people in the department
- Clinical procedures
- Bedspace & equipment
- Air Retrieval
- Outreach
- Database
- Trauma team
2. Nursing Orientation:
- A full orientation programme is given to all newly employed staff
- Supernumery time provided:
- Staff with previous experience: 120 hours
- Staff new to ICU nursing: 160 hours
- Additional supernumerary period is provided for staff orientating to cardiothoracic Intensive Care nursing.
- This is supported by an established Competency and Orientation package, which staff are expected to complete within one year of commencing work in the ICU.
3. BASIC Course:
This is two full days of training. Each Registrar is issued a certificate upon successful completion at the end of the course. The aim of the BASIC course is to teach participants to rapidly assess seriously ill patients and provide initial treatment and organ support.
- Registrars are mailed a course textbook and CD ROM prior to the start of the course.
- There is a pre-course MCQ based formative assessment
- The course consists of lectures, skill stations and tutorials taught by Intensive Care Specialists, with an emphasis on a practical approach to the management of critically ill patients
- There is a post-course MCQ test
- Target audience:
- Junior ICU doctors with little ICU experience
- Senior trainees in medicine, surgery or emergency medicine
- Senior ICU nurses
For further information, please contact Dr Louise Hitchings.
4. Registrar Teaching Sessions (Departmental)
Weekly Registrar Tutorials:
- Monday – Friday: 08:00am – 08:30am
(a timetable with allocated topics is given to the Registrars every month in advance).
CME – Continuing Medical Education:
- Tuesdays, every week: 14:30pm – 16:30pm
- Journal Club
- M n M (Morbidity & Mortality)
- Registrar teaching/journals
- Guest speaker/case presentation
Trauma Round
- Fridays, 07:30am – 08:00am
Introduction video for people thinking of joining Intensive Care:
http://media.bbsweb.net.au/cicm/CICM_PROMO_540x360.html
5. Nursing Education:
- The department is supportive of ongoing education for nurses.
- Within the department, a series of clinical workshops are run to ensure nursing staff are both informed and competent in this field.
- The educators also work in partnership with CPIT in running a graduate course in critical care nursing.
- Nurses are also able to apply for funding to complete post graduate study which is available via the Health Workforce New Zealand funding stream.
- Programmes for Nursing Staff (on CDHB intranet)