Chris Hayes (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Last week, together with the Minister for Health, I attended the opening of the Ingham Institute Clinical Skills and Simulation Centre at Liverpool Hospital. This is a new, state-of-the-art facility providing real-life training to Australia's current and future medical professionals. It has been made possible thanks to the federal government's $9.4 million investment through the Health and Hospitals Fund. The centre has some of the most cutting-edge equipment and technology, including New South Wales's first purpose-built, fully integrated operating theatre to help doctors in training, medical students and nurses to train in performing some of the most important medical procedures. The operating theatre contains anaesthetic and scrub bays, giving medical trainees exposure to what it is like to work in a surgical environment.

The centre uses a high-fidelity human patient simulator called SimMan, which is so technically advanced it allows students to have their clinical and decision-making skills tested in what could be considered a lifelike environment. SimMan can breathe, talk and perform various other human functions, allowing for real-life emergency scenarios to be created. This allows for very efficient training for situations such as cardiac arrest and car accidents involving major trauma.

In addition to training on SimMan, future doctors and nurses are able to practise on SimMum and her 'baby', SimNewB. With SimMum and baby, the centre can create an interactive birthing simulator, teaching nurses, midwives and other students how to deal with different obstetric scenarios, including complicated deliveries. The Sim baby also has the ability to breathe and cry, allowing for training in critical neonatal problems, including resuscitation of a newborn and providing treatment and care for prematurely born babies. SimMan, SimMum and SimNewB allow students to learn and to be tested on their knowledge in an environment that is very lifelike. Traditionally, students would have had to practise on each other or they were simply expected to replicate what they saw another doctor do. I can only imagine how concerning it would be to learn that you might be the first patient for a doctor to perform an important procedure on. The simulated environment not only assists in learning how to perform certain procedures, it also assists the medical team in learning how to communicate with each other while operating.

The Ingham Institute Clinical Skills and Simulation Centre is among a number of great achievements and contributions made by the Ingham Institute for Applied Medical Research. This is a charitable organisation that facilitates cutting-edge medical research benefiting the south-west of Sydney and the broader community. It fosters a collaborative partnership between the south-western Sydney local health district and two Sydney universities—namely, the University of Western Sydney and the University of New South Wales. It is one of the most advanced medical research facilities in Australia, and quite possibly in the world, and all that has been made possible thanks to the federal government's $49 million investment in the Ingham institute. This cutting edge medical research facility is now a base for more than 200 top research staff who work in various hospitals across western Sydney. Many have decided to make Western Sydney their home and have certainly added much to our economy.

I have met on many occasions the institute's chairman, Mr Terry Goldacre, and the institute directors, as well as the Director of Research, Professor Michael Barton OAM, and the institute's Chief Operating Officer, Associate Professor Greg Kaplan. They all contribute to making the Ingham institute one of the most sophisticated medical facilities conducting core research into cancer, injury, population health, brain science and mental health, cardiovascular disease, infectious and inflammatory diseases, and early years. I congratulate the institute on the opening of the Clinical Skills and Simulation Centre. I am assured it will provide the best training not only for our current medical professionals but for all those training to become leaders in the medical field in the future. (Time expired)