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Onboarding

Help I'm going rural!

Rural OnBoarding Annual programme late January to March: "Learn how to thrive, not just survive, in rural health!"

Welcome to RuDASA's comprehensive online package for new clinicians joining rural health facilities in South Africa. COVID has transformed our training landscape and we are now able to offer an orientation program that can fit in with a clinician’s busy program, and still give them access to all the knowledge and resources they need to thrive in rural health care. Although focused on new clinicians we welcome any clinician keen to update their knowledge.

A 8-week curriculum, structured into six broad categories, using a hybrid teaching methodology. Each Monday you will be sent the program for the coming week, including the links to the relevant zoom meetings; as well as links to relevant webinars, video tutorials, and related guidelines, protocols and tools useful to your daily work. These can be studied at home at a time that suits you and clinicians can tailor their learning according to their needs. Clinicians are encouraged to attend the interactive Zoom sessions on Monday evenings (with additional sessions later in the week depending on facilitator availability). These will Introduce key mentors and experts that can provide ongoing support as the course progresses. We will cover FAQ and top tips on the materials you have received.

Sessions are on a Monday or Tuesday at 18.00 using Zoom.

Overview

There are three “types” of orientation topics:

  1. Understanding the DOH working environment skills pertaining to team work, mental well being & patient centred care (all cadres)
  2. Top tips for Medical cadres, and FAQ on fields such as HIV, TB, Obstetrics, neonatal and paediatric care, anaesthetics, orthopaedics and trauma and much more.
  3. Weekly topics and material that will be uploaded and if you miss the session you can watch on YouTube.

This course is a work in progress Follow us on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter to get noice of upcoming On-Boarding sessions.

Week 1 : Infectious Diseases
Week 2: Maternal Medicine
Week 3: Adult Medicine
Week 4: Child Health
Week 5: Emergency Medicine
Week 6: Trauma, Anaesthetics and Surgery
Week 7: Mental health
Week 8: Family medicine Skills and navigating the NDOH

At the moment the clinical part of the program is heavily focused on doctors and clinical associates, but the orientation package is open to any new clinician in South Africa. The sections on employee support, the MDT team, health care worker mental health and patient centred care are particularly relevant to any new health care worker, but feel free to attend other sessions. Although this program caters for new professionals we are very happy for existing colleagues to participate in topics they feel would be useful (including interns and students). We are applying for CPD points for the webinars.

Get Started FREE for members of RuDASA, RuReSA, RuNurSA and PACASA

We recomend that you join RuDASA as you will get the links to every session and the additional resources via our Forum emails and Provincial Rural Buddy WhtsApp groups. RuDASA is privileged to have a large network of clinicians passionate about rural health care. One can easily feel isolated working in a small peripheral facility and yet there may be a clinician at the next hospital happy to give advice or support. Membership is free and gives access to a community of or rural health clinicians. Sign Up for RuDASA Please click on the Our Values box on the Sign UP page and read both statements before submitting.

Register for the On-Boarding Programme)

However anyone can register for OnBoarding just by following us on Facebook or Twitter and looking out for the advertsied sessions. Click on the link on the advert to register. Once registered you will be sent sent the Zoom link for the session.

For more information on the programme content contact :

If you are not a doctor then find out more about the Rural Health Network organisations that have been created out of a need for networking, support and advocacy amongst different cadres of clinicians. Click on the links below.

RuNurSA Rural nurses advocating for better rural nursing services

RuReSA A network of rehabilitation therapists working, advocating or researching rural rehab. All allied health staff are welcome to join

PACASA A network of Clinical Associates throughout South Africa advocating for the profession

The Rural Health Advocacy Project provides support on advocacy for all of these groups RHAP