Trauma Week

Trauma Symposium 2023

E-mobility – Current perspectives and future directions

Save the Date: Friday 17 November 2023 in Brisbane (venue tbc)

Event flyer (PDF 1.23MB)

The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and the Jamieson Trauma Institute are hosting the 2023 RACS Trauma Symposium on e-mobility devices.  The annual trauma symposiums bring together trauma professionals from Australia and New Zealand to address issues relating to trauma prevention and trauma care.  This year’s topic explores the e-mobility trend that has seen an explosion of e-scooters on roads and paths in cities around the world.  Since their introduction, e-scooter related trauma has increased substantially, with injuries and deaths in riders, passengers and pedestrians placing further pressure on first responders as well as hospital and health systems.  Trauma Committee members, Kate Martin FRACS and Prof Kirsten Vallmuur, JTI, will convene the symposium which will address the current perspective - legislation, injury statistics, patterns of injury, risk factors, lessons from the field – ambulance, ED, trauma, coroners, surveillance and future directions/potential solutions. 

Venue – tbc (Brisbane)

Registrations will open in July.

Trauma Week 2022

RACS/ANZCA/ACEM Joint Symposium: Family Violence – Health System Response - 10 November 2022 - NSW Parliament House

The symposium, convened by Assoc Prof Payal Mukherjee FRACS and Dr Ken Harrison FANZCA, included keynote speakers Dr Mayet Costello Violence, Abuse & Neglect (VAN) NSW; Professor Kelsey Hegarty, Family Violence Prevention, University of Melbourne and RWH and Dr John Sammut, President Medical Council NSW.  

Queries: trauma@surgeons.org

Please click on the links below for the following presentations and further information on Family Violence -
(1) Outcomes (PDF 181.66KB)
(2) Program (PDF 163.27KB)
(3) Surgical News (December 2022) (PDF 851.02KB)
(4) Report (PDF 184.27KB)
(5) References (PDF 102.57KB)

Queries: trauma@surgeons.org

Please click on the links below for the following presentations -

Morning session recording

Morning session (full transcript) (PDF 579.77KB)

Breakout Session Reporting

Talie Star Afternoon Speech

Dr Lai Heng Foong (full presentation) (PDF 1.97MB)

Dr Michelle Atkinson (full presentation) (PDF 4.86MB)

Dr Mayet Costello (full presentation) (PDF 6.31MB)

Professor Kelsey Hegarty (full presentation) (PPTX 1.04MB)

Dr John Sammut (full presentation (PDF 204.24KB)

Trauma Week – 2021 (Rolled over from 2020 due to COVID) - Brisbane

2021 RACS Trauma Week was part of the Australasian Trauma Society (ATS) Virtual Scientific Conference on 10 September 2021.  Dr Kate Martin and Dr Matthew Hope co-convened sessions on data quality in trauma care - Quality of Trauma Care: Monitoring and Improving our Performance and Assessing Processes and Outcomes Beyond Mortality.  These sessions were of great value to all participants and trauma specialists involved in all aspects of trauma care. 

Prof Zsolt Balogh and Dr Karen Coates convened an informative and timely session on Trauma Verification – a multi-disciplinary review to assist hospitals evaluate their care of the injured patient. 

Full program - ATS 2021 program

Pedestrians – staying safe 13 February 2019 – Melbourne 

The 2019 symposium, Pedestrians – Staying Safe brought together leading advocates, experts, researchers and clinicians to discuss the challenge of pedestrian safety.

Dr Valerie Malka, Director of Trauma Liverpool Hospital and Chair Road Trauma Advisory Committee, convened the symposium - the program included experts from key stakeholders exploring distraction, education, law enforcement, vehicle, road and future city design, safe speeds and alcohol. Pedestrians are amongst the most vulnerable road users and in Australia make up a significant percentage of visitors to various areas daily. Pedestrian safety is an interconnected public health issue, which is related to city design, road rules, speed limits, road user perceptions and attitudes, street and footpath design – all of which impact pedestrian safety outcomes.

Sponsors TAC (Transport Accident Commission), Victoria and the NCCTRC (National Critical Care and Trauma Response Centre) are keen be involved and lend support to road safety. The TAC reported on Towards Zero – Victoria’s plan to work towards no serious injuries or deaths on our roads. This vision rests on 4 key principles – safe roads, safe speeds, safe vehicles, safe people.

Please click on the link below to read the following presentations

Introduction and overview (PDF 1.47MB), Valerie Malka, Convener, Trauma Director, Liverpool Hospital

Distracted Walking (PDF 1.01MB), Grant Christey, Trauma Director, Waikato Hospital Waikato, NZ

Intoxicated Pedestrians (PDF 1.01MB), John Crozier, Chair RACS Bi-national Trauma Committee

Safe Speed Limits (PDF 2.27MB), Raphael Grzebieta, Professor Road Safety, Transport & Road Safety

Pedestrian Public Health (PDF 833.62KB), Rebecca Ivers, Injury Epidemiologist, The George Institute

Vehicle Design for Pedestrian Protection (PDF 910.53KB), David Logan, Senior Research Fellow, Monash University Accident Research Centre

Law Enforcement (PDF 2.96MB), Ray Shuey, Pedestrian Advocate

Walkable Communities (PDF 1.27MB), Ben Rossiter, Executive Officer, Victoria Walks

Road Safety Education and Schools (PDF 650.81KB), Eric Chalmers, Co-Vice President, Australasian College of Road Safety

Pedestrian Friendly Road Design (PDF 14.96MB), Bruce Corben, Road Safety Consultant

Future City Designs (PDF 3.65MB), Jason Thompson, Melbourne School of Design

Re:act – a Road Safety Initiative (PDF 1.83MB), Jerome Carslake, Manager National Road Safety Partnership Program

Smarter Planning for Pedestrians (PDF 3.29MB), Hafez Alavi, Director Safe System Strategy Infrastructure Road Solutions

Provisional program (DOCX 594.98KB)

Proudly sponsored by

Symposium: Regional Trauma in Australasia: What is possible and how far can we reach?

Trauma Week 2018 was held in Hobart in conjunction with the RACS Tasmanian Annual Scientific Meeting.

Trauma Verification - from little things big things grow 2017 Trauma Verification Symposium

A trauma symposium at RACS on 15 November 2017 explored the Trauma Verification program - history and future directions and reviewed hospital experience and perceptions.

Trauma Week was held in conjunction with the RACS Queensland Annual Scientific Meeting and the Queensland Health Forum in Brisbane, from 4-6 November 2016.

The Trauma Symposium, Trauma - we're all involved was convened by Grant Christey and Cliff Pollard, discussed the following:

• Trauma Registries and their importance to patient care Trauma Data;
• What do we collect and what do we currently do with it?;
• What data do other agencies hold and how do we link to their data collection? - Best outcome for patients and trauma services.

Forum Resolutions (PDF 30.44KB)

2015
'Fatal Distraction' explored the correlation between distractions by all road users (vehicles, bikes, pedestrians) and the epidemic of road trauma.  Mr Ben Thomson, Deputy Director of Trauma Royal Melbourne Hospital, and Valerie Malka, General and Trauma Surgeon, convened this event.

2014
'Injury in Indigenous Populations - Learning from each other' - The Trauma Committee, the Indigenous Health Committee and the Provincial Surgeons of Australia (PSA) collaborated on the joint symposium 'Injury in Indigenous Populations - Learning from each other'. This symposium was convened by Dr David Read, Chair NT Trauma Committee with the help of Associate Professor Kelvin Kong, Chair of the Indigenous Health Committee. This multidisciplinary event complemented the highly acclaimed 2007 symposium 'Injury in Indigenous Populations: Towards a Safer Future', which was convened by Professor Russell Gruen and Associate Professor Kelvin Kong.

2013
The 2013 Trauma Symposium 'Sharpening the cutting edge of trauma care' was about applying the lessons learned in war and austere environs to major trauma centres at home in Australia and New Zealand. The symposium was convened by Annette Holian, member Trauma Committee, Deputy Director of Trauma at the National Critical Care & Trauma Response Centre in Darwin and Wing Commander, Royal Australian Air Force -High Readiness Specialist Reserve.

2012
The 2012 Symposium '2020 Vision Zero - to share or not to share the way' discussed ideas in relation to eliminating death and injury as a result of interactions between various types of road users (ie cars, cyclists, pedestrians, trucks, cars etc). The audience included Surgeons, ED doctors, Paramedics, Police, Trauma Nurses, Local, State and Federal Government and Road User groups representatives. At the end of the day, participants agreed to the resolutions below that it is hoped will assist our governments to set some road safety priorities. These resolutions complement the RACS position statements on these matters.

For copies of programs, papers and resolutions, please contact the Trauma Committee Executive officer.