In December 2023, I was fortunate to complete my penultimate nursing placement at Thursday Island Hospital within the Torres and Cape Hospital and Health Service. Thursday Island is a 3.5km2 island located within the Torres Strait, approximately 39km north of the Cape York Peninsula in Far North Queensland.
Thursday Island Hospital is the referral centre for 17 primary healthcare centres across the Torres Strait.
Because of this, we often had patients arriving by ferry, commercial aircraft and emergency helicopters.
I had completed placements in rural areas previously. However, this was my first experience in a remote location with a primary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community which sparked great excitement as I would finally get experience in remote area nursing.
Transport to Thursday Island involved flying to Cairns and catching a QantasLink flight to Horn Island and then catching a bus and ferry to Thursday Island.
Thursday Island Hospital offers a range of services such as emergency, general medical, surgery, day procedures, maternity, obstetrics, gynaecology and renal.
The hospital was undergoing major renovations and currently had four emergency department bays composed of two resus bays and two consult rooms, eight ward beds and two HDU beds with the maternity, renal and surgical wards in separately attached areas.
The hospital staff were all incredibly welcoming and very keen to have a student. I was impressed at the resources available within the hospital despite its remote location, especially with their recently obtained CT scanner.
Throughout my four weeks, I spent most of the time in the emergency department, working alongside several nurses from various backgrounds. Many nurses I worked with came up on short-term contracts but ended up staying due to loving the work offered in the Torres Strait.
Learning about conditions such as RHD quickly moved from in-class theory to real-world practice with many of the presentations involving sore throats, skin sores and other general infections. I promptly learned that certain seemingly minor symptoms hold the significant potential of deteriorating into severe and life-changing conditions.
Furthermore, we also saw several emergency presentations such as myocardial infarction, sepsis and cerebrovascular accidents.
Being in a remote area, I was able to gain experience at every point of the emergency department experience, from triage, history taking, assessments and critical interventions.
Seeing the calibre of skill of the nurses at Thursday Island truly demonstrated the difference one can make as a nurse through both clinical and social means.
Moving forward, I hope to gain critical care experience by completing my graduate year in a busy regional hospital before making the jump to working in more rural and remote environments. If the opportunity arose to return to Thursday Island, I wouldn’t hesitate to take it. My experience in this remote setting truly solidified my career aspiration and I extend my utmost gratitude to CRANAplus for supporting me in this.
