PMSC12003 - Special Populations in Paramedic Practice

General Information

Unit Synopsis

In this unit you will develop the capacity to engage with, assess, and manage obstetrics and paediatric patients. Upon completion of this unit, you will be able to draw upon your knowledge of pathophysiology, epidemiology, and aetiology to provide professional, situational, and culturally appropriate treatment pathways for managing these special populations.

Details

Level Undergraduate
Unit Level 2
Credit Points 6
Student Contribution Band SCA Band 2
Fraction of Full-Time Student Load 0.125
Pre-requisites or Co-requisites

Pre-requisite - PMSC12001 Procedures and Skills in Paramedic Practice, PMSC11004 Paramedic Medical Emergencies 1 and PMSC12004 Advanced Electrophysiology and Coronary Care

Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework).

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Residential School Compulsory Residential School
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Unit Availabilities from Term 3 - 2024

Term 1 - 2025 Profile
Mixed Mode
Term 1 - 2026 Profile
Mixed Mode

Attendance Requirements

All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).

Assessment Overview

Recommended Student Time Commitment

Each 6-credit Undergraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.

Assessment Tasks

This information will not be available until 8 weeks before term.
To see assessment details from an earlier availability, please search via a previous term.

This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of ‘pass’ in order to pass the unit. If any ‘pass/fail’ tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully (‘pass’ grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the ‘assessment task’ section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%).

Consult the University's Grades and Results Policy for more details of interim results and final grades

Past Exams

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Previous Feedback

Term 2 - 2024 : The overall satisfaction for students in the last offering of this course was 93.02% (`Agree` and `Strongly Agree` responses), based on a 28.1% response rate.

Feedback, Recommendations and Responses

Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.

Source: Student Feedback
Feedback
Inconsistencies were identified between academics at residential school
Recommendation
All academics teaching in the unit will receive identical explicit instruction. A Zoom meeting will be held before residential school to ensure all academics are consistently trained in assessment facilitation.
Action Taken
A Zoom session was conducted and emails sent to all leading academics across the three campuses to ensure that the same information was given to each campus.
Source: Student Feedback
Feedback
There was limited opportunity to complete enough scenarios at residential school due to large group numbers
Recommendation
Attempt to employ more casual staff members to ensure appropriate academic/student ratios to assist students in getting exposure to scenarios.
Action Taken
Sessional academics were employed to improve academic/student ratios. At times, this was still difficult due to lack of availability of casual staff.
Source: Student Feedback
Feedback
Unit layout was well received by students, with equal time allocated to obstetric and paediatric patients
Recommendation
Keep the layout similar in future deliveries of the unit.
Action Taken
The unit layout maintained equal time allocated for paediatric and obstetric patients. Geriatrics was also introduced this year, and was also allocated equal time.
Source: Student Feedback/Unit Coordinator reflection
Feedback
The time limit for the first quiz was very tight. An extra 10 - 15 minutes would be beneficial
Recommendation
Increase the allocated time for the first quiz.
Action Taken
The intended adjustment was to extend the time limit for the first quiz; however, due to an error, the quiz was limited to 60 minutes. This issue has been noted, and the timing will be revised for the next delivery of the unit to ensure students have sufficient time to complete it.
Source: Unit Coordinator reflection/student feedback
Feedback
Some students struggled with the understanding and interpretation of the written assessment details.
Recommendation
Provide extra discussion around the written assessment to ensure understanding from students.
Action Taken
Further information for the written assessment was provided to students via Zoom sessions, power point presentations and tutorials.
Source: Student feedback
Feedback
More tutorial sessions would be useful.
Recommendation
Schedule more tutorial sessions throughout the unit.
Action Taken
Tutorial sessions were scheduled for every 2 weeks. This was a similar time frame to previous offerings; however, instead of being general conversational sessions, these sessions were more structured and focused on consolidating the weekly learnings through such things as case reviews, drug calculation practice, questions an answer etc. This ensured that students were getting the most out of these sessions that are difficult to increase in frequency due to placement commitments.
Source: Student feedback
Feedback
Assessment alignment needs improvement.
Recommendation
A review of the assessment strategy and all assessment tasks will be undertaken to ensure alignment with the expected academic standards and learning outcomes for the unit.
Action Taken
In Progress
Source: Student feedback, staff feedback, Unit Coordinator observation
Feedback
Obstetric and neonatal manikins showing wear and tear.
Recommendation
Discussions are to occur with the HoC regarding the state of manikins and equipment.
Action Taken
In Progress
Unit learning Outcomes
This information will not be available until 8 weeks before term.
To see Learning Outcomes from an earlier availability, please search via a previous term.