Antarctic-bound doctors have spent a week in Tasmania’s Central Highlands to experience the freezing and extreme conditions they will face on the frozen continent.
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University of Tasmania’s week-long Expedition Medicine Winter Course, in conjunction with the Australian Antarctic Division, was held at the Arm River near Cradle Mountain, wrapping up on Saturday.
It provided participants with practical experience in expedition skills and providing medical care in extreme environments.
“Each of Australia’s Antarctic research stations and the sub-Antarctic station on Macquarie Island has a medical practitioner who is responsible for the care and well-being of expeditioners,” Australian Antarctic Division’s Dr Clive Strauss said. “While they are supported by the division’s tele-medicine systems connecting them to experts in Hobart, training our Antarctic-bound doctors in a range of medical and expedition skills is essential.”
“The division has spent many decades developing and refining how it delivers medical care in extreme and isolated environments to ensure it can respond to scenarios as required and deliver high quality health care in Antarctica and the Southern Ocean.”
UTAS School of Medicine’s Dr Paul Scott said the course was developed in 2006 when the need to train doctors in wilderness medical skills was recognised.
“Participants were confronted with a wide array of complex medical scenarios,” he said. “Often there are very comprehensive technical obstacles which they need to overcome before they are able to access injured patients. Examples include having to abseil down cliff faces, conduct search and rescue in the snow, or work around fast moving water.
“Participants then need to apply the principles of wilderness medicine in very challenging environments, often in the dark, usually in the rain and occasionally in hail, sleet and snow.”
Dr Scott said participants usually ended up tired and wet but “very challenged and satisfied” at the end of the eight-day field course.
“One of the huge benefits of this course is that doctors and highly skilled outdoor professionals are responding together to complex scenarios.
“The partnership between the University of Tasmania and the Australian Antarctic Division is ideal as it we create an ideal training ground for doctors and outdoor professionals interested in remote and polar medicine.”
The course was part of the remote and polar stream of the Masters of Public Health, offered through UTAS.
“The expedition medicine course is ideal training for doctors who are soon to work in Antarctica, as the experiences on this course closely reflect the working relationship they will have with fellow Antarctic expeditions,” Dr Scott said.
