The flying surgeons

Aim

To provide surgical services locally to regional and rural communities in a timely manner.

Benefits

Patients are closer to home which results in big cost savings and they also have faster access to surgery.

Background

The Flying Specialist Services (FSS) provides an emergency call out service throughout Queensland, and as such, absolute priority is given to emergency flights. The FSS has four permanent seats allocated to a Flying Obstetrician or Gynaecologist, Flying Surgeon, Flying Anaesthetist and Flying Clinical Nurse Consultant. The flying surgical services have been very successful to date.

Evaluation and results

• The flying surgical services have been very successful to date with numbers increasing.
• The first of the service was recently evaluated, all parties are very happy with the model of care, the local member and board chair are equally happy as id the community.
• The surgeons providing the surgical services enjoy the experience and are continuing in the role for another year.
• The actual surgical outcomes will be provided.

Lessons learnt

Safe surgical care can be provided at rural and regional sites successfully.