No. Nurse educators are not replaceable! This program provides nurse educators a clear, consistent baseline to work from and provides extensive resources for ongoing education.

In addition, your educators will receive education metrics about each learner so you can be sure you have a safe level of knowledge at system level, and your patients are in safe hands. 

Nurse educators are key to the success of the program. 

Perianaesthesia nurse education in Australia has reached crisis point. COVID-19 led to an exodus of experienced educators and a significant reduction in supervision periods and education standards. 

Most hospitals are unable to provide 12 months of supervised experience in anaesthetic nursing as recommended in ANZCA PS08 - Guideline for the Assistant to the Anaesthetist. In fact, many are only able to provide 3-6 weeks of supervision and education. 

This program provides each new anaesthetic nurse with a safe and consistent knowledge base, and provides your educators with the resources to ensure you have a safe and competent perioperative team. 

We provide the foundation with our Anaesthetic Assistant Starter Course. We then provide ongoing learning via our Advanced Anaesthesia Live Series. 

Once in the program, all learners and educators have ongoing access to the content. Simply add your learners as they enter your organisation, we will take care of the rest!

All anaesthetic and recovery nurses will benefit from this program.

You are changing your education culture by creating a shared educational model so that experienced staff know what is being taught and have great tools for teaching. 

Your new nurses will start from the beginning and build a safe knowledge base, then progress to the advanced modules to grasp more complex topics around crisis and airway management. 

The program provides an excellent refresher for experienced anaesthetic nurses, those working in endoscopy and those required to occasionally assist the anaesthetist.

The learning objectives of the Starter Course are:

1. Understands the important hazards within the operating theatre environment to patients and healthcare providers
2.  Understands the importance of trained vigilance in anaesthesia and has a framework to build such skills
3. Has a framework to address authority gradients within a perioperative team to protect patient safety
4. Has a framework to extract a safe plan from the anaesthetist for each list and anticipate clinical problems
5. Understands the 4 essential monitors of anaesthesia including information provided, normal ranges and sources of error
6. Understands the 6 important classes of drugs for general anaesthesia and how they can be safely identified
7. Understands how drug errors occur, why they are relatively common in the operating theatre and ways to prevent them
8. Has a framework to ensure they have the correct equipment for each case, and can anticipate airway problems utilising a shared mental model

Our Advanced Anaesthesia Live Series covers:

• Expected difficult airways
• Unexpected difficult airways
• Anaphylaxis
• Massive transfusion
• Malignant hyperthermia
• Advanced life support
• Paediatric airway emergencies
• Obstetric emergencies
• Neurosurgery
• ENT 
• Emergency cases
• Self-care after critical events
• Advanced airway techniques
• Patient positioning 
• Ethical dilemmas in the workplace

When you have provided us with the email addresses of those entering the program, we will provide each learner an individual login and password to the Member Section of our website, periopconcepts.com.

Our Periop Concepts App is an easy way for learners to access the content. This is free and available on the Apple App Store.

Each learner will receive their own copy of the Anaesthetic Assistant Handbook, and be granted access to all past and future education sessions. We will provide your team with copies of our Complete Guide to Airway Management book.

Your managers and educators will also be granted access to the above content. 

We're here to help!

We will make regular contact with your nominated educator, however, you can contact either Jack ([email protected]) or Andrew ([email protected]) for any issues.

Once we have confirmed the appropriate package for your hospital, we will provide you with an invoice. The program will begin on receipt of payment. 

No. We believe the program is most valuable when all of your perianaesthesia nursing staff have access to great educational resources. 

We will provide your educators with an easy method for adding new staff as they enter your organisation. 

Please note that staff who work outside of the perioperative unit are not included in the program unless otherwise specified. 

Your educators will have access to monthly Zoom sessions with us where we will provide engagement updates, work through any technical issues and plan for future sessions.

We will provide a 3-monthly report to your educators detailing learner progress and the topics covered in our regular sessions.

You will receive a detailed Annual Education Report. 

Yes. Periop Concepts and the Anaesthetic Assistant Starter Course are endorsed and accredited by:

The Australasian College of PeriAnaesthesia Nurses (ACPAN)

The Australian College of Nursing

The Australian Society of Anaesthetists. 

The Anaesthesiologists Society of Namibia.

ACPAN Accreditation Reference No: ACPAN2023/1