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Friendship and a supportive learning environment: sharing critical care skills

Gayle Brunskill is a critical care practice development nurse at Addenbrooke’s Hospital. She’s been involved in the SCALE Critical Care project for a couple of years and recently returned from her second three-week placement in Kampala sharing learning and embedding knowledge with Ugandan staff.

 “I have always been passionate about ensuring equal access to healthcare worldwide and became aware of the SCALE Critical Care project from my line manager, who has been instrumental in growing the project.

SCALE is an initiative between the Ministry of Health in Uganda and the NHS in the UK that is developing the capacity and knowledge of the critical care workforce in both countries. It uses bi-directional, virtual and face-to-face teaching to share learning and build skills. It also offers placement opportunities for UK and Ugandan nurses to enhance critical care training, practice and research.

The project is special because of the friendship between staff in Uganda and the UK, and the supportive learning environment. It gives me the opportunity to share my 20 years of critical care experience, as well as my extensive experience as an educator of critical care nurses.

I had the privilege of working with a group of highly dedicated professionals who it was a joy to share knowledge and experiences with.

For the first week of the visit I was part of a larger cohort of UK critical care nurses, co-delivering teaching and training with Ugandan staff at Kawempe National Referral Hospital (KNRH) and Mulago National Referral Hospital (MNRH). I then stayed on for an additional two weeks to embed the learning. My focus was on good quality CPR, A-E assessment including auscultation, GCS assessment and pupil reactions. I taught and supported the implementation of the ventilator care bundle, the implementation of pressure ulcer surveillance and provided education about pressure ulcer prevention.

It was rewarding was to see the development of knowledge and expertise in the people I had met on previous trips. And it was brilliant to see the nurses in Uganda sharing their learning with the newer staff.

As always, this visit has further developed my teaching ability, as I had to vary my approach to meet the needs of who was present. Teaching a large cohort of nurses with differing levels of experience meant I had to adapt my teaching to accommodate this.

I also learnt a lot about infectious diseases rarely seen in the UK.

The learning acquired during this visit will give the Ugandan team greater confidence to continue audits of the ventilator care bundle and pressure ulcers. It’s also deepened the relationship between Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (CUH) staff and our Uganda colleagues.

I’ve brought back to the NHS improvements in my teaching ability and greater knowledge of infectious diseases. I’ve spoken about this on Cambridge radio and presented the SCALE project’s work at our practice development meetings, which I hope will inspire others to get involved.”

Find out more about the SCALE Critical Care project, or contact us at info@cghp.org.uk  


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