International Rural Trauma Education Meeting:  “The Secondary Survey”

Last October, members of the Rural Trauma Committee of the ACS Committee on Trauma met in San Francisco at ACS Clinical Congress and explored rural trauma education in international venues.  Since then I have had the privilege to observe two courses in Norway; a basic course in Kirkenes, and a course designed for a more urban environment in Voss.

I was very impressed with our commonalities.  As a matter of fact it was possible to follow the slides in Norwegian as long the subject was medical.  I think the basics of trauma resuscitation are known to all of us now courtesy of ATLS and its international promulgation.

I would like to focus on the next step.  What do we need to do to educate our non-trauma colleagues to avoid the pitfalls that we have all stumbled into at one time or another? Our goal for this session is two fold: consensus on pitfalls we need to avoid; and to develop future directions for development. 

If you think you have some examples of problems that need to be addressed and would like to present at this meeting; please contact either me at jimkessel@aol.com or Tom Foley at foley@marshallnet.com to be put on the agenda. We are sorry that no funds are available to support travel to this meeting.

James W. Kessel, MD, FACS
Rural Trauma Committee
Committee on Trauma
American College of Surgeons

Online August 8, 2006

Trauma