Community Service Leave Testimonials

Stephen Woods, Data Manager
Children’s Cardiac Centre
Princess Margaret Hospital for Children

I’m writing to express my gratitude for the Community Leave Support that I’ve recently received, which will assist me to take part in Operation Open Heart Papua New Guinea 2011, the second OOH trip I’ve been involved with as a volunteer.

Operation Open Heart brings volunteer Australian doctors and nurses to Papua New Guinea to provide heart surgery that would not normally be available in that country. Without surgery, most of the children would die as teenagers. Before OOH, just two selected patients were given access to treatment annually overseas. Since OOH began in 1993, Australian medical teams working with their PNG counterparts have performed life-saving surgery on an average of 50 children a year.

My role in the OOH team will be to provide IT and logistics support including maintaining an up to date “blog” website, and to digitally capture and document what is happening with the program. It is a great privilege to be able to share the skills and knowledge that I have gained during my ten years with the Children’s Cardiac Centre at PMH with both the OOH team and the staff at Port Moresby General Hospital.

The community service leave funding supports the Cardiology Department in covering my absence, and importantly to me preserves my annual leave (which I used use two weeks of on my previous OOH trip to Rwanda). The community service leave provision is a great encouragement to participate in these sorts of programs for both individuals and the departments in which they work. In addition to the assistance to the worthy aid programs that volunteers provide I believe there is a tremendous educational benefit in participating that flows back to them, their departments and through to the whole of the Health Department.

Mark Woodard, Nurse Educator
Paediatric Intensive Care Unit
Princess Margaret Hospital for Children

Aid work, whether in developing countries or in regional areas of Australia, offer those local communities skills and knowledge that they may not normally have access too. The aim of many of these aid programs is to develop the knowledge and skills of local communities with the ultimate goal being sustainability. Operation Open Heart, the volunteer organisation I have been involved with, offer children an improved quality of life and also life expectancy. Additionally, following their heart repairs, these children are more able to contribute to their family existence. This process isn’t all one-way though. Staff who return from these aid trips return with improved leadership skills, time management skills, and problem solving skills, and ingenuity in managing their work space i.e. managing the many power failures and gas failures.

Traditionally, the existence of aid programs have relied on the good will of health professionals who have often volunteered their time, utilising valuable annual leave and paying thousands of dollars to fund their flights to the location of the aid recipient. This community leave initiative will help ensure the sustainability of these aid programs to areas less fortunate than Australian Metropolitan centres, and continue to professionally develop WA Health employees.

Community Service Leave Testimonials

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