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Safeguard or mollycoddle? An exploratory study describing potentially harmful incidents during medical student placements in Aboriginal communities in Central Australia
Author(s) -
Patel Ameeta,
Underwood Peter,
Nguyen Hung The,
Vigants Margaret
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
medical journal of australia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.904
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1326-5377
pISSN - 0025-729X
DOI - 10.5694/j.1326-5377.2011.tb03079.x
Subject(s) - audit , documentation , northern territory , exploratory research , incident report , medicine , patient safety , nursing , medical emergency , medical education , psychology , family medicine , geography , political science , forensic engineering , business , health care , engineering , archaeology , sociology , computer science , anthropology , programming language , accounting , law
Objective: To assess the number and characteristics of potentially harmful incidents occurring during placement of medical students in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory. Design, participants and setting: A retrospective audit of medical students’ files from Northern Territory General Practice Education placements in Central Australia for the period from January 2006 to December 2007. Main outcome measures: Number and type of potentially harmful incidents. Results: A total of 163 placements were undertaken. Of these, 98 (60%) had adequate documentation to determine whether an incident had occurred. There were 28 cases (17%) where potentially harmful incidents were judged to have occurred. Most incidents fell under several descriptive categories, but clinical supervision, professional practice and administrative issues were most common. Conclusions: One in six students experienced a potentially harmful incident during remote area placement in 2006–2007. While acknowledging the exploratory nature of this investigation and the major educational benefits that clearly arise from these placements, our findings indicate problems with clinical supervision and administration.