The Royal College of Anaesthetists (RCoA) hosted the e-SAFE: Safer Anaesthesia from Education event on April 29, launching their e-SAFE DVD, and highlighted how the anaesthetic community are working together to improve healthcare for under-resourced countries.
The event follows in the same vein as the ESA’s recent initiative to improve patient safety across Europe, by distributing a USB containing a Patient Safety Starter Kit. The RCoA’s safety initiative looks to spread good practice further still than Europe, to places as far as Africa.
The RCoA formally launched the e-SAFE DVD at the event, and it serves as an example of joint working. The RCoA and Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland (AAGBI) developed and funded e-SAFE as an educational tool to support anaesthetists working in resource-limited areas. It contains interactive e-learning sessions from RCoA’s e-Learning Anaesthesia project, video tutorials and AAGBI training material.
The event discussed the work that is ongoing to improve healthcare for those countries facing very basic challenges, such as the delivery of the SAFE obstetric course in Uganda, the development of a nurse anaesthesia training programme in Liberia and improving access to pulse oximeters through Lifebox’s work. The event also presented exhibitions from e-SAFE, e-Learning Anaesthesia, Lifebox, Mothers of Africa and Diamedica as part of the programme.
The day also served to showcase the RCoA’s e-Learning Anaesthesia project undertaken with e-Learning for Healthcare which has grown to over 1,000 sessions covering 400 hours of learning. HRH The Princess Royal was in attendance at the event, and ended the meeting by thanking all those involved in the highlighted projects for their enthusiasm and hard work.
