Plenary Speakers
Opening Plenary Speaker - Anthony Gallagher, RN, PhD
Closing Plenary Speaker - Mavis Muaudzi
Opening Plenary Speaker
Anthony Gallagher, RN, PhD
Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland
Prof. Anthony Gallagher began training in nursing in 1977 and qualified in 1980 from the Western Health and Social Services School of Nursing, County Derry, Northern Ireland. He completed a BSc (Hons) in Psychology (1988) at the University of Ulster and was awarded his PhD in Psychology at Trinity College Dublin in 1992. In 1992, he was appointed at Queen’s University Belfast as a Research Officer, Research Fellow (1993), Lecturer in Psychology (1995) and Research Director of the Northern Ireland Center for Endoscopic Training and Research. In 1998, he was appointed as Consultant Psychologist (Hon.) Royal Group Hospitals Trust and in 1999 Assistant Director, The Queen’s University Centre for Health Care Informatics. He was the first Academic from Northern Ireland to be awarded a Fulbright Distinguished Scholarship and during this time worked with Prof. Richard Satava at Yale University (2000 – 2001). In 2003, he moved full-time to the United States to take up appointment as Director of Research at Emory Endosurgery Unit and Adjunct Professor at Emory University. He was appointed as Professor of Human Factors at the National Surgical Training Center at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland in October 2005. His principal research interests currently include virtual reality, education and training in procedural based medicine. Dr. Gallagher is also a regular keynote speaker at national and international medical and science conferences.
Virtual Reality Training for the Operating Room and Cath Lab: A Paradigm Shift in Medical Train
High profile cases of medical errors in the United States (US) and the United Kingdom (UK) and major reports for professional organizations such as the Institute of Medicine (US) and Senate of Surgery (UK) have sensitized the public and medical professions. Medicine and Professions allied to medicine have identified training as a key area that must be tackled to positively impact on the problem of medical errors. This is particularly important for medical disciplines such as surgery and interventional cardiology where the delivery and quality of care is dependant on the technical skills of the attending physician. Despite the radically novel skills required from the physician to proficiently practice minimally invasive surgery (MIS) or interventional cardiology (IC) the current training paradigm has gone largely unchanged from that used by William Stewart Halsted at Johns Hopkins in the 19th Century. At the end of the 20th century, the public and the medical profession have concluded that training on patients is no longer acceptable. Medicine is currently undergoing a paradigm shift in the way that procedural skills are trained. There are now at least two published studies that have demonstrated in prospective, randomized, double-blinded trails that VR significantly reduces objectively assessed intra-operative errors. This lecture describes the new training paradigm, the methodology required for VR to work effectively and some of the business, political and clinical forces which are driving this change in training practice.
Closing Plenary Speaker
Mavis Mulaudzi, BA Cur, MA Cur, PhD
North West University, South Africa
Fhumulani Mavis Mulaudzi was born in a rural village in the Limpopo province, South Africa. She obtained her diploma in nursing at Venda Nursing College. She worked as a nurse in hospitals and rural clinics for more than ten years in her former homeland of Venda. She thereafter took up lecturing, starting at the Venda Nursing College, and then moved on to the University of South Africa (Unisa) then to the University of Pretoria. She is currently employed as an associate professor of research at the North West University.
As a visionary, she was captivated and fascinated by evolving nursing ethics in the changing country and globalization. She has delivered papers nationally and internationally on different topics such as ethics, moral renaissance in the nursing profession, domestic violence, indigenous knowledge, Ubuntu, Batho pele principles, human rights and midwifery. She is very interested in interrogating human rights discourses and ethics that are informed by both Western and ‘Africa-based’ epistemologies, such as those presented by the African Philosophy of Ubuntu. She is an advocate of cultural issues. Dr. Mulaudzi is a member of the Bamboo Bridge Community, a community of Sigma Theta Tau International. She is also a board member of the Indigenous Knowledge System of South Africa Trust (IKKSA).
Mainstreaming the African Philosophy of Ubuntu in Health Research Methodologies and Ethics: A Transcultural Perspective
The diversified and multi-cultural environment that health practitioners in South Africa and globally operate in requires more than one approach to research. Research as it is now is based on the western approach, which is predominantly built around western beliefs and culture. As a result, it is quite oblivious of the complex cultural make-up of the indigenous people and thus can scarcely meet their needs.Most of the clinical research especially in HIV/AIDS is conducted among the vulnerable and indigenous people who end up not benefitting from the research. Health care professionals face an enormous challenge of finding a comprehensive and holistic approach to research which will meet the diverse needs and expectations of the society they serve. . This paper sets out to initiate debate and dialogue in the context of education and research exploring inputs from a human rights approach, globalisation and poverty with the concept of 'Ubuntu' in mind. It argues that with challenges posed by the aftermath of globalisation we need to start thinking on transcutural nursing education and research from different perspectives related to issues of science and culture such as philosophical considerations, multicultural science education, and indigenous knowledge systems. Indigenous community members, health workers, academics, and researchers are at the frontlines of health in communities and are therefore, the experts of current conditions. There is a need to find ways to address the issues and implement strategies that have positive and tangible outcomes for communities. There is also a need to recognise and affirm that the holders of knowledge are experts in both transcultural education and research. Transcultural education will only be sustainable and realised if we are willing to shift policies and programs to better reflect the needs and wishes of Indigenous people.