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CFA VICTORIAN BRANCH COMMITTEE NEWS: Health promotion Officer

Health Promotion Officer soon to be appointed 

CFA National has been successful in gaining funding for five health promotion officer positions.The funding is part of their new funding agreement with DoHA .These five positions will be located in the following states Victoria, New South Wales, South Australia, Western Australia and Queensland.The purpose of the position is to increase the capacity  for continence promotion and awareness raising activities at a state level. There are specific responsibilities within the funding agreement with DoHA but it is anticipated that the position will be able to provide support to state initiatives.The Victorian position will also be working with the Tasmanian State Branch.

Look out for the advertisement for this position it will be out in the next month or so.

Judy Sincock

CFA VICTORIAN BRANCH COMMITTEE NEWS:Chirstine Murray's Uganda Trip

In December 2010 I was lucky enough to receive sponsorship from CFA Victoria to assist me in traveling to Uganda for a two week visit as part of a surgical team. I am a Continence Nurse Advisor working in the Urogynaecology Unit at the Mercy Hospital for Women, Melbourne. I arrived in Entebbe, Uganda on Sunday 18th December 2010. We traveled some eight hours to the hospital in Kagando, south-western Uganda, close to the border with Rwanda. The Kagando Mission Hospital is a 250 bed general hospital, run by the Uniting Church of Uganda.

Work at the hospital started on the day we arrived, with Prof Judith Goh and Dr Hannah Krause assessing more than 30 women that Sunday evening. This enabled them to set up the first few operating lists for the following few days. The women had heard about the arrival of the team by way of a radio campaign asking them to come if the had vaginal fistula or other gynecological disorders. The doctors were particularly looking to treat women with vesico-vaginal fistula, recto-vaginal fistula and severe genital prolapse requiring surgery.

My role in travelling with the surgical team was to educate the nursing staff of the fistula ward and the general surgical ward areas, about topics such as good bladder habits, pelvic floor exercises and also to introduce the practice of clean intermittent self catheterization to those requiring it. The nurses were very keen to learn new techniques and skills. I was able to leave them with various Continence Foundation of Australia publications to help with these lessons.

Over the course of the two week stay more than ninety women presented to the hospital and were assessed with some fifty-six operations performed. Needless to say the staff in the wards were extremely busy during this time, but still graciously accepted instruction in the care of their patients. Hopefully long-term improvements in the treatment outcomes of women attending this hospital will be seen in the future, based on the simple lessons learned during this visit. I thank the Continence Foundation of Australia (Vic Branch) for its generous financial support.
 

PROJECT UPDATES: Launch - Continence in Ethnic Communities Project

VCRC is in the final stages of completion of the Continence in Ethnic Communities Project. The project report is currently being written in collaboration with Monash University, School of Midwifery and Nursing, following independent data analysis by the university. The report will include findings and recommendations from the focus group consultations held with 10 different ethnic communities about incontinence. The learnings give us an insight into the cultural barriers people from diverse ethnic backgrounds face in accessing information and services related to incontinence.

The report will be launched on 12th May 2011 at Rydges in Preston. Beth Wilson Health Services Commissioner  will be the keynote speaker. You are invited to attend  the launch to register your details please call us on 9816 8266 or email info@continencevictoria.org.au.

Following the launch, the project report will be available to download form the VCRC website.
 

PROJECT UPDATES: One Step at a time easy read guide

The Easy Read Guide to Toilet Training is at final draft stage. This resource is for parents with a child with special needs whose English literacy skills are low. This guide is significantly shorter and simplified version of One step at a time. There are 5 sections, the design of the guide will allow individual sections to be given to parents if giving the whole guide would be overwhelming.

The next stage is to pilot the Guide with the intended audience. We are working to have the guide available by the middle of the year.

Writing this guide has been a challenge – anything but easy. We are learning how to write in easy English, short sentences that give straight forward information. In learning these skills we realised that a lot of health information for clients is too complex.

If you are interested in exploring writing Easy English these are good places to start: www.scopevic.org.au click resources www.saifscotland.org.uk click on publications reports and guides.
 

PROJECT UPDATES: Healthy Bladder and Bowel Habits in Schools

CFA National is undertaking this project that aims to increase awareness and understanding of healthy bladder and bowel habits in Australian primary school children. Late last year a stake holder’s forum was held. The discussion was passionate and many issues and ideas were raised.

One idea being explored is ways to improve the standard of toilet facilities for all school children. School toilets can be problematic either from a cleanliness perspective or from a safety perspective. There are frequent reports of bullying occurring in or around school toilets. In a recent news report a grade 6 was asked what was the most important piece of advice she was going to give to her prep buddy? She said “Where to find the toilets and what ones to go” (The Age Tuesday 21 February 2011).

The working group for this project is made up of health and educational professionals from each state, who work with children. Susan McCarthy is on the working group as the State Resource Centre Managers representative.

To receive updates regarding this project email: media@continence.org.au
 

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: HACC Training - Water for Wellbeing

VCRC conducted a professional development training workshop with staff from HACC programs in the Northern metropolitan region in early March. The workshop was part of the annual HACC training calendar which is supported by the Department of Health.

The session focused on providing HACC program staff involved in the delivery of programs and assessment of clients with information and tips to:

• understand the importance of adequate fluid intake among frail elderly
• identify strategies to promote adequate fluid intake among the frail elderly

Participants learnt about the health benefits of adequate fluid intake, why the older person is at risk of dehydration, evidence and recommendations for adequate fluid intake and tools for promoting fluid intake in the care setting. Participants also received a copy of the ‘Water for Wellbeing’ toolkit. Check out the kit on our website at: www.continencevictoria.org.au/resources.

Feedback from participants was positive stating the workshop ‘offered something different on the calendar’. Other sessions are planned for semester two later this year in the Northern, Western and possibly some rural regions.

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: One Step at a time

In the first three months of this year VCRC have conducted several highly successful professional development workshops.

Three workshops based around the booklet One Step at a time: a parent’s guide to toileting skills development for children with special needs. This time round these workshops were for staff working in special development schools where toileting and dealing with incontinence is a major aspect of their daily work.

Each of these workshops addressed toilet training and the older child. We defined older as a child over eight years. We clearly stated we had no magic wands in addressing the issues but the discussion and the feedback on the presentations were very positive. Thanks to Fiona Davis, Jeannie Symes, Nadia Walton and Shirley Whitaker who presented at the workshops.
 

COMMUNITY EDUCATION

Community education sessions have also kept us busy in the first three months of the year. Request from CALD groups remain strong. We anticipate with the release of the finding from the Continence in Ethic Communities project demand from CALD groups will increase.

We have also conducted several talks to parents about toileting skills and toilet training.

WORLD CONTINENCE WEEK: 20th - 26th June 2011

This year Continence Awareness Week has moved to June (from August) to align with World Continence Week 20-26th June. VCRC is focusing on the theme of continence in ethnic communities with the completion of the project and launch of the report in May.

A professional development seminar will be held for services and staff working with CALD clients. The program will include learning’s from the Continence in Ethnic Communities project, putting recommendations into practice, including strategies for improving awareness, prevention, management and support of incontinence.

Professional development seminar: Behind Closed Doors: Incontinence in Ethnic Communities

Date: 23 June 2011
Venue: Tracey Centre

Stay tuned for further details.

WORLD CONTINENCE WEEK: National Campaign

The National Campaign for World Continence Week has as its theme: Exercise and the pelvic floor (supported by the campaign Pelvic Floor First)

The aim is to increase awareness about the link between inappropriate exercise and pelvic floor muscle dysfunction and encourage pelvic floor safe exercises as an alternative to those exercises that can potentially harm the pelvic floor (thereby causing bladder and bowel control problems)

The target audience is men and women who have a higher risk of pelvic floor problems and who also exercise or play sport including

• Pregnant women
• Women who have recently or ever, had a baby
• Women who are going through or have gone through menopause
• Women who have undergone gynaecological surgery
• Men who have undergone surgery for prostate cancer

Typically this includes women aged 25-55 years and men aged 50 years or more.

The secondary audience is

• Fitness professionals and
• Health professionals (including continence professional and other health professionals such as midwives, practise nurses, maternal child health nurses and GPs.)

 Resources for WCW:

• Double sided poster (one side targeting gyms and sports and fitness centres and one side targeting continence clinics, community centres, GP clinics ect)
• Pelvic floor first microsite www.pelvicfloorfirst.com.au
• 1800 33 66 00referral card (for fitness instructors to discreetly provide their clients)
• Consumer brochure: Protect your pelvic floor and stay in control
• Fitness professional brochure
• Speakers kit (for continence professionals to use to deliver education to fitness professionals)

You will be sent information very soon on how to order these resources

NEW RESOURCES: Protect your pelvic floor and stay in control

Contact National Office on 1800 33 00 66 to order your copies of this new resource

Check out the new website: www.pelvicfloorfirst.com.au

NEW RESOURCES: Translations - DOHA & RDNS Standards

A recent review and update of translated incontinence factsheets available from the Bladder Bowel website was conducted by the Department of Health and Ageing. The factsheets (17 in total) now align in content to the set of incontinence information brochures (1-17) in English. Several new language translations have been included.

The languages available include:Arabic, Chinese (traditional and simplified), Croatian, Dinka, Dutch, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Macedonian, Maltese, Persian, Polish, Serbian, Somali, Spanish, Tagalog, Turkish, Vietnamese (note the new languages are in bold)

Click on the link below to access the new factsheets on the Bladder Bowel website

http://www.bladderbowel.gov.au/publications/comlangfactsheets.htm
 

CAREX: 6th - 7th April 2011

VCRC will again be at CAREX. The Aged Care Expo will be at Caulfield Race Course 6 & 7 April. This is a good expo for us as many students attend - aged care workers, nurses, OTs. They are very keen on gathering information so we always need plenty on hand.

We are presenting a session Continence problems: More than just being old?

The session will discuss the reasons frail older clients may develop bladder and or bowel control problems. A key message is that incontinence should never be accepted as normal. First line management strategies will be discussed that can improve the person’s sense of control and quality of life. These sessions are always well attended and the feedback is very positive.
 

DATE KEEPERS

12 May 2011 - Launch of Continence in Ethnic Communities

23 June 2011 - Behind Closed Doors: Incontinenece in Ethnic Communties

16-19 November 2011 - The 20th national Conference on Incontinence Melbourne