In 2023, the National Critical Care and Trauma Response Centre (NCCTRC) established seven Technical Working Groups (TWG), which were vital in the lead up to both AUSMAT’s World Health Organization (WHO) Emergency Medical Team (EMT) re-verification, and NCCTRC’s Australian Council of Healthcare Standards (ACHS) reaccreditation. These TWGs are instrumental in ensuring the availability, clinical appropriateness and adherence to best practices of clinical guidelines, specialist equipment, medical pods and consumables in the deployable cache. Tasked with managing the NCCTRC and AUSMAT technical area agenda, they drive change and improve care in deployment settings by providing clinical expertise and advice to the NCCTRC Clinical Governance Committee (CGC).
Experts from around Australia represent these technical and speciality groups, meeting regularly to review relevant protocols within the AUSMAT Clinical Compendium. This ensures their relevance and alignment with current evidence-based practices, first developed in 2015 for the first WHO EMT verification of AUSMAT in 2016. The TWGs aim to enhance efficiency in AUSMAT deployments by proactively reviewing documents and equipment lists, ensuring the availability of the best, peer-reviewed protocols and equipment.
A novel approach within these TWGs is the integration of pharmacy insights, notably through NCCTRC’s Specialist Clinical Pharmacist, Melanie Morrow, who participates in six of the groups. Highlighting the strategic decision behind this integration Melanie explains, “It was decided that rather than forming a Pharmacy TWG, that the pharmacy team would sit on the majority of the working groups, feed any medicine queries through the appropriate group and also be on hand to address future medicine issues and considerations as they arise.” This collaborative model streamlines operations and ensures a multidisciplinary approach to healthcare challenges, making Melanie's involvement crucial for weaving pharmaceutical considerations into the fabric of the TWG’s decision-making processes and enhancing the overall efficacy of AUSMAT deployments.
Following this model of multidisciplinary collaboration, Jacintha Pickles, a Registered Nurse and Midwife with AUSMAT Clinical Leadership training and a specialty in neonatal and paediatric critical care, contributes her expertise from a nursing background to the Paediatric and Maternity Working Groups. Reflecting on her involvement, Jacintha highlights, “In the Maternity Working Group, I worked on the Routine care of the Newborn and Care of the Low Birthweight (<2500g) guidelines. Our aim with these documents was to demonstrate AUSMAT's capabilities and serve as a resource for clinicians on deployment.” Jacintha was also involved in refining the Management of Paediatric Diabetic Ketone Acidosis (DKA) guidelines.
Having an AUSMAT-specific guideline ensures clinicians from all over the country are working from the same, unified protocol whilst on deployment. The development of this new guideline was truly multidisciplinary, with input from nursing, medical, and pharmacy.
Both Melanie and Jacintha emphasise the importance of multidisciplinary teamwork in ensuring that the guidelines are clinically appropriate and reflective of the latest evidence-based practices. This effort highlights the TWGs' overarching goal: to optimise care and ensure the highest standards of health service delivery in deployment contexts. The dynamic and responsive nature of the TWGs fosters an environment of continuous improvement and innovation. By leveraging the specialised knowledge of professionals like Melanie and Jacintha, the TWGs address the complex healthcare challenges in austere environments, ensuring AUSMAT deployments are supported by the most current, evidence-based clinical guidelines and practices.
Carla Yeung
Communications and Digital Engagement Officer
