Anne Eaton's globe-trotting career has sparked enthusiasm for helping others get out of their comfort zone, so they can become better health professionals.

The midwife link academic not only endures her own blistering travel schedule, educating students and health workers throughout Queensland and overseas. She's also helping others to broaden their experience in culturally diverse and under-resourced settings.

Anne Eaton looks forward to returning to Nepal

Donations of medical equipment, supplies or funds for the Nepal or Cambodia  

outreach programs can be made via Leona Hancock  ph 4940 7532 email l.hancock@cqu.edu.au,

Ms Eaton was born in Uganda and lived in Kenya before completing her education in the UK and embarking on an around-the-world career as a ship's nurse with P&O. She has been actively working as a nurse /midwife for 24 years.

Now based at CQUniversity Mackay, Anne still spends a lot of her time living out of a suitcase.

This year alone, she's helped the Council for Remote Area Nurses of Australia provide workshops in Maternity Emergency Care in Roma and Midwifery Upskilling in Mackay.

Anne gives health tips in Nepal

She's helped the not-for-profit ALSO (Advanced Life Support Obstetrics) Asia-Pacific organisation provide an Obstetric Emergency Management course in Alice Springs, with another due in Cairns in September. In between, in August, she will visit Fiji to run a course as well as a train-the-trainer program to help the Fijian health sector to become self-sufficient in running future events. These courses are multidisciplinary as they involve obstetricians, GPs and midwives.

Anne is also the only external invited member of Queensland Health's Maternity Crisis Resource Management simulation training program for doctors and midwives, which runs from hubs in Brisbane, Rockhampton, Mackay and Townsville. She's part of the Mackay hub but also travels to other hubs as needed.

The academic's core role is dealing with student midwives in clinical placements at 17 hospitals throughout Queensland and she visits each of these sites over an 18-month period, supporting students and conducting workshops. This year she has already visited hospitals in Brisbane, Townsville, the Gold Coast, Charleville and Proserpine, while conducting three residential schools in Mackay.

Anne helped escort a group of CQUniversity nursing and midwifery students to Nepal in November last year and they were able to experience how health camps and hospitals operate in a resource-challenged environment, while providing skills and delivering donated medical equipment and supplies.

Students are once again fundraising and gathering equipment and supplies for a return trip in November this year and they have permission from the airline to transport enough gear to leave some behind in Nepal - everything from toothbrushes to fetal heart monitors.

Anne says the overseas trips give students the chance to be a 'minority amongst the majority' and they often have to use sign language to communicate.

To extend this benefit, Anne and her academic colleagues have been helping the Mackay health service district to establish its own overseas program, so health workers can volunteer during their holidays.

"We're organising the trip so our professional colleagues in the health community can also experience working in a resource-challenged community ... in this case Cambodia in February," Anne said.

"CQUniversity's contribution will go beyond facilitation to include pre-departure workshops about teaching in a culturally-appropriate manner and about cultural diversity and practice.

"Once established as a district initiative we can open it up to health professionals throughout Queensland."

Anne says her own experience shows that working within a vastly different environment can give people a deeper and richer outlook on life.

"It's good to encourage students and professionals to understand their own identify through interaction with other cultures. After all, Australia is becoming a much more multicultural society so it helps for people to open their eyes to a culturally diverse environment."