Transcript for General Surgery Training in Northern Queensland
[Soft music plays in the background]
[Text on screen] Specialty Training in Northern Queensland, General Surgery.
>> Dr Alan de Costa:
[Text on screen] Dr Alan de Costa, Associate Professor of Surgery, Cairns Base Hospital
For me, being a surgeon is like being in my skin, you know? It’s the only thing I’ve ever wanted to do with my life. I was born in Sri Lanka and grew up in Sri Lanka and I had a very sort of sporting background, but I always knew that I was going to be a surgeon.
>> Dr Munad Kahn:
[Text on screen] Dr Munad Kahn, Urology Registrar, Cairns
Early on, I decided I wanted to do a surgical specialty because I enjoyed the sort of physical challenges that surgery brings about. Anatomy is one of my favourite subjects in medical school and so surgery gives you obviously that hands-on opportunity. You are able to impact on a patient’s management in a very quick manner, the results of surgery is seen almost immediately.
>> Dr Alan de Costa:
One of the things that’s special in training up here is that a high percentage of cases would be emergency cases and trauma. It’s a very important part of this thing we call General Surgery, which is, in many ways foundational surgery for all the other specialties.
>> Dr Tess Asgill:
[Text on screen] Dr Tess Asgill, Surgical Registrar, Townsville
You can do Urology, you can do General Surgery and Colorectal Surgery and within your general surgery, they do breast and endocrine surgery and upper GI, so there’s a few different things you can experience and learn here. The bosses are all quite keen to get their registrars and PHOs upskilled so that they can do the operating and develop their skills as surgeons.
>> Dr Munad Kahn:
There’s a lot of one-on-one time with your supervisors, with your consultants, so they can certainly guide you in the right direction a lot more readily than can be done in a bigger hospital.
>> Dr Tess Asgill:
You don’t have the same competition for exposure to different operations and different conditions. It’s easier to get the exposure that you want and the experience that you want.
>> Dr Munad Kahn:
The Da Vinci machine in urology is very unique, it allows us access to a very hard part of the body to access. A lot of our work in cancer is related to prostate cancer and doing operations on the prostate is challenging just because of where it sits. It’s a very small organ that sits basically entirely behind the pelvic bone, so the advantages of a Da Vinci, is that you’re able to have several arms in the pelvis without compromising the integrity of the pelvic bone. We know in all aspects of surgery that patients have quicker recoveries when they have robotic procedures compared to a traditional open procedure.
>> Dr Alan de Costa:
We have physical beauty all around us, we have the sea, the mountains, we have the reef of course, and the rainforest is not far away. And all these things of course make living here quite special.
>> Dr Munad Kahn:
The opportunity to work in North Queensland is I think very unique and having the combination of being in a sort of small unit plus having access to these new technologies, that’s an experience that stands you in good stead.
>> Dr Tess Asgill:
There are days where it’s hard and you go why am I doing this? But it’s a specialty where you can make a huge impact on patients’ lives. Get them back on their feet, get them back to work and you can do it just in a few hours in an operating room and that’s a pretty cool feeling.
[Text on screen] Explore specialty training opportunities in northern Queensland. nqrth.edu.au
All General Surgery specialty training can be completed in northern Queensland facilities.
The region provides exposure to the majority of General Surgery techniques and includes outreach experience in rural and remote centres.
Trainees will gain operative experience in a wide range of procedures.
This video was funded by the Australian Government Department of Health as part of the Regional Training Hubs initiative. Produced in partnership with northern Queensland health care providers and James Cook University.
[James Cook University crest appears on screen] Northern Queensland Regional Training Hubs. A network of medical training opportunities. nqrth.edu.au
End of transcript