Supporting Early Career Allied
Health Clinicians in Rural Australia
Lisa Harvie and Karyn Newnham
Presenter: Karyn Newnham
Poor retention of allied health care
workers is a problem in rural areas
and has negative implications for
individuals clinicians, health care
organisations, and patient care.
Challenges for organisations supporting early career graduates
Organisations are responsible for supporting staff, especially those early in their career.
Rural areas offer opportunities to develop skills quickly, however, being physically isolated from a bigger team may also leave clinicians vulnerable to early career
burnout.
Retaining staff and professional development
opportunities are logistically challenging but vital in
supporting early career clinicians in rural settings.
Challenges for Early Career Graduates
Early career marks the transition from student to professional and coincides with a number of
challenges including:
relocation away from home and support systems
development of sense of self
confidence, and,
professional identity.
Challenges for Early Career Graduates
This period of transition can leave health care workers vulnerable to:
anxiety,
depression,
feeling isolated, and,
burnout.
Apart from the personal cost, clinicians may then be less
able to provide quality patient care.
Aim of the program
Provide professional development
Patient centred skills practice
Networking opportunities
Enhance work satisfaction
Reduce burnout and increase staff retention in rural
settings.
Content of the program
3 previous early career programs have been evaluated via qualitative, quantitative and post program focus groups.
This review process has guided and shaped the
content of today’s program.
Participants
Graduates and those ‘early in their career’ came from a number of different allied health disciplines:
Pharmacy, Podiatry, Physiotherapy, Speech Pathology, Prosthetics, Occupational Therapy, Neuropsychology and Psychology.
Attendance varied from 8 to 14 participants per group,
with an average of 11 attending each session.
Method:
10 sessions, 2 hours duration, across nine months
Content included: supervision, career development and identity, resilience and sources of support, building skills in motivational interviewing, time management, self-
care, and resolving conflict.
Each session was evaluated with quantitative and
qualitative feedback including pre and post knowledge
of the subject, and how well learning objectives were
met in each session.
Evaluation of program
Quantitative and qualitative
E.g., What was the most valuable part of the session
1 Strongly Disagree
2 3 4
Neutral
5 6 7 Strongly Agree Before the session my knowledge
of the topic was comprehensive After the session my knowledge of the topic was comprehensive The content was relevant to my
________________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________________
Results :
Participants strongly endorsed the program content
In particular, increasing their skills when working with challenging clients, resolving conflict, and motivational interviewing empowering behaviour change in clients.
Clinicians talked of feeling overwhelmed and under skilled when dealing with conflict and difficult clients.
Overall, participants enjoyed the ‘hands on’/‘role play’
activities, and opportunities to connect with other early career
clinicians
2 3 4 5 6 7
Increase in Knowledge
Conclusion
Early career is a stressful time and facilitating this transition is important for staff retention.
This program was successful in meeting its objective to provide professional development opportunities and
support for early career graduates.
This program may be helpful for ongoing support to Allied
Health professionals in other regional rural settings.
Thank you
A C K N O W L E D G E M E N T S : P a r t i c i p a n t s
B a l l a r a t H e a l t h S e r v i c e s K y l i e M c K e n z i e
A n n a W o n g S h e e
G r a m p i a n s R e g i o n a l A l l i e d H e a l t h W o r k f o r c e D e v e l o p m e n t a n d A d v i s o r y C o m m i t t e e
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