Discipline of Rural Health - Faculty of Health Sciences - The ...

Rotation out of your home unit for specialised or extended training
General practice settings provide ample exposure to internal medicine, geriatrics, paediatrics, obstetrics and
gynaecology, and a spattering of trauma, ophthalmology, otolaryngology and other specialist areas of
practice. In some general practices however, exposure to certain areas of practice is less than optimal for
teaching purposes. In these circumstances students will be rotated out of their home site to another site for
a specified number of weeks for teaching in specific areas. Examples of common rotations for specialised
teaching include:
• to Port Augusta paediatric specialist unit for PCH paediatrics rotation
• to Gawler, Port Pirie or Whyalla Obstetrics and Gynaecology specialist units for Obstetrics and
Gynaecology (HRH) rotation
Allied health learning
You will often be co-located with allied health and nursing students and some social activities will be
arranged for all students within a site. Currently there are no organised programs for exposure of medical
students to allied health learning and it is up to students to seek these opportunities for themselves.
Possibilities include working with radiologists, midwives, physiotherapists, podiatrists, occupational
therapists, speech pathologists, dieticians and more. Recognising that the scope of health services is greater
than medical care alone will assist students to remember to include allied health referrals and services and
in answers to examination questions, and to provide multidisciplinary health care that is better than its
component parts after graduation.
Medical Record Documentation
Based on the South Australian Medical Record Documentation and Data Capture Standards
Where a clinician documents in free text fields such as progress notes, the following must be documented:
• The date and time of entry. Dates are to be written in dd/mm/yyyy format and times are to be
recorded using a 24hr clock
• signature
• surname and initials
• designation eg. Medical office, nurse, physiotherapist
A rubber stamp may be used to indicate the designation and surname only. In a large organisation, it may
also be appropriate to include the clinician’s pager number.
Where a clinician documents in structured fields, for example, medication charts must document the
following:
• date and time of entry
• signature
• Identifiable initials (AHIMA 1996). Rubber stamp signatures are not acceptable.
All entries in the medical record by the clinical students, authorised to document in the record should be
authenticated by the student and countersigned by a fully qualified professional with the dare, surname,
initials, designation and signature (Huffman 1994, pg 107)
This includes the need to write the date AND time of entry, signature AND Surname and initials, designation
of medical student and name of supervisor/preceptor.
The student should ensure his or her entry is countersigned by the nominated medical supervisor
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