Program and Speakers
Draft program (as at Thursday 28 August 2008) [PDF, 25 KB]
Please click here for presenter briefing notes (secure login area)
The conference will examine all aspects of care from training and emergency procedures to responsibilities and legal implications.
The program will feature presentations by international and national leaders in pre-hospital emergency care, updates on treatments and procedures.
There are several session themes including:
- primary care
- pre-hospital education
- advanced care
- emergency planning
- extended scope of practice
Associate Professor Lawrence Brown, Associate Director of Research for the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA, will present a thought provoking keynote presentation examining leadership through research. Building on lessons learned through the U.S. National EMS Research Agenda project, this session reviews the steps every EMS system can take to help identify evidence-based EMS practices, and to incorporate those practices into their services.
Professor Brown also intends to answer the age old question, “Do warning lights and sirens reduce ambulance response and transport times?” and describe the many potential roles for EMS systems within public health, specifically in health education and in the more comprehensive function of health promotion.
Dr Jerry Nolan, a consultant in Anaesthesia and Intensive Care Medicine at the Royal United Hospital, Bath, UK will provide an overview of contemporary resuscitation practice specifically addressing recent evidence relating to ‘chest compression only’ CPR.
Dr Nolan will be presenting two concurrent sessions, focusing on pre-hospital airway management and the controversial area of fluid resuscitation in patients with major trauma.
There will also be a number of invited national experts, presenting a range of sessions directly relevant to the pre-hospital emergency care arena.
Keynote presentations, concurrent sessions and posters will encourage lively and valuable discussion throughout the forum while a debate has been scheduled which promises to be both entertaining and controversial.
Continuing Paramedic Education (CPE) points
A total of 13 CPE points are available to delegates who attend all available sessions at the ACAP 2008 National Conference. Points are calculated on the basis of 1 point per 60 minutes of CPE activity. For more information on CPE points, visit the ACAP National website.
Call for abstracts
The call for abstracts is now closed. Thank you to those that submitted an abstract. You will be informed via email as to the outcome of your submission in June 2008.
Publication of abstracts
All abstracts selected for presentation at the ACAP National Conference will be published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Emergency Primary Health Care (JEPHC) in the issue immediately following the conference. All authors presenting abstracts at the conference are also asked to consider submitting their full papers to JEPHC for publication. Please contact the journal’s Managing Editor, Rhona Macdonald to obtain further details.
Australian Pre-hospital and Emergency Health Research Forum (APEHRF) Best Paper and Best Poster Award
The Australian Prehospital Emergency Health Research Forum, (APEHRF) as part of the International Prehospital Research Forum is now in its fourth year of involvement with the ACAP National Conference.
The collaboration is enriched between ACAP, the APEHRF and Monash University Department of Community Emergency Health and Paramedic Practice (DCEHPP) with the aims of the ACAP to provide a national platform for policies and representation of ambulance personnel, and represent the interests of their members throughout Australia, on matters relating to professional prehospital care and associated issues.
The focus of the APEHRF is also to promote and encourage collaboration and research in the phase of pre-hospital emergency care by its kinship with the US (UCLA Center for Pre-hospital Care) and UK (999 Research Forum).
Since its initial launch at the ACAP National Conference in Canberra in 2005, the APEHRF has acted in an advisory capacity to the ACAP annual conference scientific committees in the common goal of attracting quality research papers and posters presented at ACAP National Conferences. In its role, the APEHRF has guided new standards in the submission of abstracts, in addition to increasing the scientific rigour, which is facilitated by double blind peer-review of submitted abstracts by a group of appropriately qualified independent peer reviewers. A further standardised adjudication process is employed during oral and poster presentations at each conference to determine the final winners of the APEHRF Best Paper and Best Poster Awards.
The APEHRF Best Paper Award is provided to one winner at the ACAP National Conference each year and is determined by the highest cumulative score between the initial peer review of abstracts, and further adjudication (by two independent adjudicators), of those selected abstracts which are orally presented at the conference. The Award is also reciprocated with the UK and US Research Forums, to provide registration for the visiting winners to attend the affiliated conference at one of the three countries.
Abstracts selected for oral and poster presentation at the ACAP National Conference are published annually in the Journal of Emergency Primary Health Care, which as a peer reviewed publication, provides a source from which academics can claim their research contributions (abstracts or full papers) towards the Australian Higher Education Research Data Collection.
The following prizes will be awarded at the ACAP 2008 National Conference:
APEHRF Best Paper Award
- Framed certificate
- Engraved plaque
- Registration at an appropriate conference incorporating a research forum (provided via a reciprocal agreement with a participating research forum)
- Return airfares and accommodation sponsored by MDI in memory of Dr David Komesaroff to the value of $4000.00 to the conference referred to above
APEHRF Best Poster Award
- Framed certificate
- Registration for one person (first named author or as agreed by the authors) at the ACAP National Conference in 2009
- $150.00 book voucher to be redeemed at the ACAP shop
International keynote speakers
Lawrence Brown (USA)
Lawrence Brown is a paramedic with more than 20 years of emergency services experience. For the past 12 years he has worked primarily in research and academic settings. He currently serves as an Associate Professor and the Associate Director of Research for the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA. Lawrence is a member of the Board of Advisors for the Prehospital Care Research Forum, served as a co-investigator for the National EMS Research Agenda project, and is the lead author for the text, “An Introduction to EMS Research.” In 2006, Lawrence moved to Queensland, Australia to study at the Anton Breinl Center at James Cook University, earning a Master of Public Health and Tropical Medicine degree in February of 2007. Since returning to the U.S., Lawrence has worked to strengthen the links between research, EMS and public health, specifically in resource-poor settings.
Jerry Nolan (UK)
Jerry Nolan is a Consultant in Anaesthesia and Intensive Care Medicine at the Royal United Hospital, Bath, UK. He is Co-chairman of the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR), Chairman of the Resuscitation Council (UK), a Board Member of the European Resuscitation Council, Editor of the journal Resuscitation and the Royal College of Anaesthetists Representative on the Council of the College of Emergency Medicine, UK. Jerry’s research interests include airway management, post resuscitation care, therapeutic hypothermia, and life support course development.
International invited speakers
Guy Caspi (Israel)
Guy Caspi, Paramedic, Chief M.C.I Instructor and Director of the M.C.I training program - Magen David Adom in Israel - the Israeli national emergency medical services and Blood Services. Started his way in Magen David Adom as a youth volunteer in 1979, employee as EMT since 1986, paramedic certification - 1995, current position since 1999. Responsibilities include: basic and advanced M.C.I training for M.D.A employees and volunteers; development of training programs and continuing M.C.I education programs; drills and emergency exercises for agency staffers. Introduction of M.D.A's M.C.I protocols to other emergency agencies for the purpose of on-scene coordination and cooperation. Took part – both as a paramedic and debriefing officer, in most M.C.Is which took place during the past 9 years in Israel; regular participant in International conferences and symposiums, mainly in U.S.A and Europe. Hosted and instructed international EMS professionals (USA, Italy, Singapore, Nigeria, Uganda and more) on the Israeli approach.
Myles Jen Kin (USA)
Myles Jen Kin completed his undergraduate work at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) where he graduated with a degree in Psychobiology in 2005. He went on to obtain a masters degree in Medical Sciences at Boston University. Myles is currently a second year medical student at Lincoln Memorial University-DeBusk College of Osteopathic Medicine.
Myles also won "Best Oral Presentation" at the EMS Today Conference in Baltimore, Maryland (March 2008).
National invited speakers
Stephen Bernard (Victoria)
Associate Professor Stephen Bernard is an Intensive Care Physician at the Alfred Hospital and Director of Intensive Care at Knox Private Hospital in Victoria, Australia. He is also a Medical Advisor to Ambulance Victoria, and a Retrieval Coordinator for Adult Retrieval Victoria. His research interests include the use of induced hypothermia for the treatment of neurological injury after resuscitation from out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. He has published the results of a number of clinical trials in this area, more recently examining the role of large-volume, ice-cold intravenous crystalloid fluid for the induction of hypothermia by paramedics after resuscitation from out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. Associate Professor Bernard is also the chief investigator of a prospective, randomised, controlled clinical trial of rapid sequence intubation after severe head injury by paramedics in Melbourne.
Peter Cameron (Victoria)
Professor Peter Cameron is head of the Prehospital, Emergency and Trauma group within the Department. He is also Academic Director of the Emergency and Trauma Centre, The Alfred Hospital, Head of the Victorian State Trauma Registry and Associate Director of the National Trauma Research Institute. His main research interests include trauma epidemiology, injury prevention and management, prehospital care and health services and systems research. Past appointments include Professor of Emergency Medicine, Chinese University of Hong Kong; Chief of Service, Prince of Wales Hospital Hong Kong; Professor/Director of Emergency Medicine, Royal Melbourne Hospital, and Director of Emergency Medicine, Geelong Hospital. He is also a past president of the Australasian College of Emergency Medicine (ACEM), coeditor of the Adult Textbook of Emergency Medicine and a senior examiner for ACEM. He completed his medical undergraduate training at Melbourne University in 1981 and fellowship training in Emergency Medicine at Western Hospital, Melbourne 1987. An MD in Trauma Epidemiology was completed through Monash University in 1997.
Paul Holman ASM (Victoria)
Paul Holman has a broad and diverse operational background and management experience within the Ambulance industry over 30 years. Operational experience as Paramedic in Mobile Intensive Care Ambulance, Air Ambulance, Helicopter, Communications and Field Management. Paul is currently Operations Manager Specialist Emergency Response Department, Ambulance Victoria and is responsible for all Emergency Management and Planning encompassing CBR response, major incident management, the MAS emergency response plan and the development and running of the MAS Emergency Operations Centre. The department manages Air ambulance Victoria, Mobile Intensive Care services (MICA) CBR, USAR and Emergency Management Training. Paul is a member of the Australian College of Ambulance Professionals – Victoria and holds a Graduate Diploma in Administration (Health) and was Awarded the Ambulance Service Medal (ASM) in 2007.
Belinda Lewis (Victoria)
Dr Belinda Lewis is a Lecturer in the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, Monash University at the Peninsula Campus. She teaches interprofessional education (IPE), health social sciences and health communication to students in Paramedics, Nursing/Paramedics, Physiotherapy, Occupational Therapy and Health Science. Belinda has coordinated the establishment of the new IPE program in School of Primary Health Care at Peninsula Campus. She publishes and presents seminars about the challenges and future opportunities associated with IPE. Belinda’s research is focused on crisis, recovery and community sustainability with recent work focused on Bali after the 2002/5 bombings and Sri Lanka after the 2004 Tsunami. Her co-authored book, ‘Bali Forbidden Crisis’ is published in the US by Rowman & Littlefield later in 2008.
Peter O’Meara (New South Wales)
Dr Peter O’Meara is the Associate Professor of Pre-hospital Care and Associate Head of the School of Biomedical Sciences at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst, New South Wales. He teaches social science subjects in both the pre-hospital and health services management programs. Along with Professor Carol Grbich, Peter has recently edited a forthcoming book “Paramedics in Australia: contemporary challenges of practice.”
Peter is currently supervising a number of students in Australia and North America undertaking Doctoral and Masters by research degrees in pre-hospital care and health services management. He is a Fellow and NSW Branch Board Member of the Australian College of Ambulance Professionals and a member of a number of national and international professional bodies.
Jeffrey Rosenfeld (Victoria)
Professor Jeffrey V Rosenfeld - MBBS, MD, MS, FRACS, FRCS(Ed), FRCS(Glasg)(Hon), FACS, FACTM, MRACMA. Jeffrey V Rosenfeld is the Professor and Head of the Department of Surgery, Central and Eastern Clinical School, Monash University and the Professor / Director of Neurosurgery at the Alfred Hospital. He is also Adjunct Professor Centre for Military and Veterans’ Health, University of Queensland and Honorary Professor in Neurosurgery to the University of Papua New Guinea (PNG) and Honorary Professor of the Neurosurgical Department of the Beijing Tiantan Hospital and of the Capital University of Medical Sciences, Beijing, China. He is a Brigadier in the Australian Defence Force (ADF), Assistant Surgeon General – Army and Director General Health Reserves – Army. He is one of Australia’s leading academic neurosurgeons and senior military surgeons. He has served in Rwanda, East Timor, Solomon Islands, Bougainville and Iraq. He graduated MBBS in 1976 from Melbourne University and did a Masters Degree through Melbourne University and Doctorate through Monash University. He has a particular interest in research on severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) and has had a long standing interest in improving health care in the developing countries of our region particularly PNG. He is an international leader in surgery for hypothalamic hamartoma which causes severe epilepsy in children. He was President of the United Nations Association Australia (UNAA) (Victoria) and Commissioner of St John Ambulance Australia (Victoria). He is very fortunate to have a lovely wife and three teenage children and has a passion for music.
Brett Williams (Victoria)
Brett Williams is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Community Emergency Health & Paramedic Practice, Monash University, and has been heavily involved in the transition of paramedic education from TAFE origins to the higher education sector in Australia and New Zealand. In recent years Brett has successfully obtained funding in DVD simulation, clinical placement alternatives, interprofessional education and educational technology enhancement. He is currently undertaking a PhD at the Centre for the Advancement of Learning and Teaching, Faculty of Education at Monash University.
