Doctors and nurses around the island are expected to become better equipped with the knowledge and skills to care for trauma patients with life-threatening injuries.
A team from the Jackson Memorial Hospital recently visited Saint Lucia to facilitate an Advanced Trauma Life Support course.
The course is aimed at ensuring a safe and reliable method for immediate management of trauma patients at the hospitals.
Consultant Surgeon Dr. Charles Greenidge says he is very pleased with the training as it serves as an effective means of saving the lives of patients who have experienced trauma.
“The ATLS course is a prescribed way of looking after trauma patients. One of the problems of looking after trauma patients is you can be distracted and the ATLS is a way that you can stay on point and make sure the things that are most important are dealt with first. So, this is an international situation where it started in the United States but is now being done in over 80 countries and St. Lucia is one of the more recent countries to start running the ATLS programme.”
President of the Heart, Lung & Blood Foundation Delia Octave says she is delighted that her organization saw the need to provide financial support to such an initiative which will benefit both doctors and nurses.
“We have never had training in trauma life support and hence we find it important, especially because of all the incidents and accidents. It is vital that we educate and train our medical professionals in that aspect.”
Trauma Surgeon at the Jackson Memorial Hospital Dr. Gerd Pust says his organization remains committed to working with the Saint Lucian doctors and nurses to develop trauma care for the most severely injured patients.
“This is the first time this year we are actually involving the nurses in the care of trauma patients. They are doing the Advanced Trauma Nursing course and learning the skills necessary to take care of very injured patients. This is a long term collaboration, and the plan is to do this every year. We are very happy that two of Saint Lucia’s surgeons came to Miami to do the instructor course, and they are now instructors for the Advanced Trauma Life Support course.”
Doctors and nurses from the Victoria, St. Jude and Tapion hospitals benefitted from the Advanced Trauma Life Support course.