It Takes Heart

Dreams Come True: Marie's Journey in Remote Nursing

• Hosts Samantha Miklos & Kate Coomber • Season 1 • Episode 10

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Marie Davey, an inspiring figure in the world of remote area nursing, joins us to share her extraordinary journey. From starting her nursing career in New South Wales in the 1980s to embracing the challenges and adventures of remote area nursing in Australia, Marie has become a symbol of resilience and adaptability. Listen as she recounts her memorable experiences, such as navigating to a placement by mail truck and tinnie during the wet season. 

Marie brings to life the diverse responsibilities of remote nurses, who often serve as the sole healthcare resource in their communities. With hands-on experience in various fields from maternity to corrections health, Marie highlights the essential training and support needed to succeed in remote nursing roles. Her personal story illuminates the unique challenges faced, emphasising the need for a solid mentorship network, especially for those just beginning their remote nursing careers.

Through Marie's reflections, we explore the importance of building trust and the rewards of making a difference in isolated locations. She offers invaluable advice for aspiring nurses to remain open and curious, while also sharing insights into the lifestyle changes and job security challenges that come with contract work. This episode celebrates the transformative experience of remote nursing, where personal growth meets the opportunity to contribute significantly to communities in need.

This episode of It Takes Heart has CEO of cmr Sam Miklos hosting alongside Head of Talent and Employer Branding, Kate Coomber. 

We Care; Music by Waveney Yasso 

More about Marie's Charity of Choice, Beyond Blue:

Beyond Blue
We all have good days and bad days. Then there are those days when something isn't quite right, you've got something on your mind, or things just seem too much. Beyond Blue’s free mental health services help connect you to that person. No matter who you are, or how you're feeling, reach out to their free counselling services for support – they’ll point you in the right direction so you can get the help you need.

Visit https://www.beyondblue.org.au/get-support for more information.

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Follow @ittakesheartpodcast on Instagram, @cmr | Cornerstone Medical Recruitment on Linked In, @cornerstonemedrec on TikTok and @CornerstoneMedicalRecruitment on Facebook.

Sam Miklos:

Welcome to it Takes Heart. I'm Sam Miklos and I'm Kate Coomber. We hope you enjoy these incredible stories of healthcare professionals making a difference in communities across Australia and beyond. Through our conversations, we look to celebrate the spirit of community and care. We acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land who have long practised and shared ancient methods of healing, providing care and support for their communities with wisdom passed down through generations.

Kate Coomber:

Join us as we explore what it truly means to take heart.

Sam Miklos:

So our guest today is full of life. Marie Davey is the epitome of remote area nursing. Adaptable, resilient, with a diverse skill set and a great sense of humour ensures that she can navigate the complexities of healthcare in remote and sometimes pretty harsh environments. Mari began nursing in New South Wales in the 80s, at a time when you were trained on the job. She's been helping and healing patients throughout several decades, which then led her to remote area nursing.

Sam Miklos:

Her initial foray into remote nursing was a stint in FIFO work in 2019, and then it was full steam ahead, with her husband, peter, at her side, where they were adventure across Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory. Mari particularly enjoys contracts about eight weeks or less, so she can stay fresh and energised for her patients whilst also taking in those beautiful landscapes that so many of us Aussies miss out on. Mari is finally living the dream that she had as a child discovering remote areas of Australia in amongst our First Nations people. The team at Cornerstone describe Mari as one of the most easygoing, fun, resilient and dedicated rands who will literally do anything to get to a placement, including and I can't believe this story riding the local mail truck and a tinny to get to a placement in a remote community. I think we should start there. I firstly welcome Mari to the it Takes Half podcast. Can we start with that story?

Marie Davey:

Well, I guess it's a case of you know, when people don't actually know how remote remote is, and when a community is cut off in the wet season and you get to the contractor who's supposed to get you there on a bus, and they go. There's no bus, it's wet season, but the mail vehicle's going out, yep out yep, and yes, they get you onto that um vehicle, uh, which is a four-wheel drive, which, yes, had to go through quite a bit of water to get get us to the clinic at daily river.

Sam Miklos:

Yeah yeah, talk about commitment. So I believe you've just completed a contract in Palumpa in NT, is that right? Absolutely beautiful I was just going to say everyone says it's just beautiful up there. I guess can you first just share with us what is a remote area nurse and what's the role of the RAN in the community for those who aren't familiar.

Marie Davey:

So remote in itself can be anywhere from an hour from Darwin to well. I think the furthest I've been is six hours southwest of Catherine. But these are places that our local First Nations people live, yep, and they don't have a hospital, they have a clinic. So a remote nurse goes and works in that clinic. It's basically an eight to five job and then there's an on-call roster 24-7. So nurses are called in to do that. Our main reason for being there is for primary health care. So you're looking after medications. You're not just a nurse, you're the pharmacist. You're dispensing their medications that come from the pharmacy. You're not just a nurse, you're the pharmacist. You're dispensing their medications that come from the pharmacy. You are the first aider. You're patching up the kids, you're patching up adults, you're doing the immunisations. You're pretty much doing everything.

Sam Miklos:

And are you supported by other healthcare professionals or are you sole nurse in these positions?

Marie Davey:

No, I've not personally worked in a sole nurse environment. Palumpa was three nurses, sal was the manager and two other nurses. The GP would come in every Wednesday, fly in every Wednesday with a registrar doctor and then, other than that, you had a doctor on call. So if you needed the doctor, you would ring them. At other times we follow the CARPA manual, which is the standard manual of practice for the Northern Territory, and if there's something that's not in there that you need to talk to a doctor about, then that's when you would ring what we call the DMO or the district medical officer.

Sam Miklos:

So you dived into the world of remote area nursing in 2019. What was your nursing career like before that? What areas did you practice in?

Marie Davey:

The majority of my time was spent in. I did 15 years in maternity, wow, and then got out of that. I got a bit burnt out in that and then I went into in-home care. I went from there to aged care, then into general practice and I think general practice probably set me up the best for remote, because it is primary health care as well. Yeah, and at that point I did like my immunisation certificate. I did well women's screening, I did sexual and reproductive health, so ear management, so lots of things there that was setting me up. From there I went to corrections health and then community health before I left there. And yeah, would you say like on that.

Marie Davey:

I was going to say, my first placement was at Timber Creek, the first remote placement.

Sam Miklos:

Yeah, and how easy was that transition? Because all of those skills that you've just listed right there, like that is such a diverse skill set. You know a lot of RNs might not have all of those skills coming into remote, Particularly the dispensing medications and things like that. Like how easy was that transition.

Marie Davey:

Look, it's terrifying anyway, I bet Any change. If you're working in the hospital and you're working on a medical ward and you're suddenly going off to the surgical ward, it's terrifying because it's a different field. So remote nursing was again a different field and I thought I knew a lot about nursing until I got remote.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah, I've heard that a lot about nursing until I got remote.

Marie Davey:

Yeah, I've heard that a lot Remote nursing is a whole different ballgame completely. Can I ask?

Kate Coomber:

I guess, what drove you to do it. Then it's very different. You've done some vast things across nursing, but what was really the thing that spurred you on to do it? Did I hear from, maybe, the team that you'd been dreaming about living remote since?

Marie Davey:

you were little. Yeah, so my very best friend, who is also a nurse and she works in Dubbo, still nursing we always we wanted to be Aboriginal. When we were children, we wanted to be Indigenous. We had our own little language that no one else understood. I don't know that we understood it either.

Kate Coomber:

I think we just had a connection.

Marie Davey:

And knew what each other wanted. We were neighbours. We've been friends all of our lives. So, yes, for 61 years we've been friends, wow. And then I went nursing, got married, so it was sort of out of the picture. It was always in my background, always at the back of my mind. My children left home. My marriage broke down. I met a new partner. I'd said to him that that was what I wanted to do and he went. Go for it, he and very much encouraged me to do my maternity emergency care course, um, the remote emergency care course, uh, the advanced life support and pharmacotherapeutics.

Sam Miklos:

so they're four courses that you pretty much have to have and your immunization yeah, yeah, I was going to ask you is there any other study that you had to do? Or they were the main four things.

Marie Davey:

They're the main ones that you needed to do.

Sam Miklos:

I think nearly every agency that you will talk to will request those things Is there anything so that, now that you have been doing this role for a while, is there any other courses in addition to those four that you think, oh gosh, like they would really help you along the way?

Marie Davey:

I since have done my long acting reversible contraception course. Yeah, so I'm inserting planons into women and remove them. That's one I've done since I've been in the Northern Territory. There's a huge focus on emergency stuff, but very little of what we do is emergency. It is mostly primary care, right, and there's certainly a lot that you will learn on the job. Simply because you don't know what day today is going to bring. The majority of nurses wouldn't know how to look in an ear, but you can learn that on the job.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah. Asking another nurse, asking the doctor, and I guess getting to a clinic that can really support you when you get out to those communities. I guess, if you're stepping into that for the first time, how important is that for you to have support around you to make you feel confident? Essential, yeah.

Marie Davey:

Essential. I was very blessed and there is one of the girls that I worked with at Timber Creek, kimmy. I still give her big hugs because I say to her without her, yeah, she really was my mentor to remote.

Kate Coomber:

I guess that could really be quite critical to make you decide yeah, I can do this and let's keep going with various contracts.

Marie Davey:

And I think too absolutely if you go remote and you have a bad first experience you're not likely to hurry back.

Kate Coomber:

True, so that it is important yeah, what's probably been the biggest surprise for you, as you've thought about it all your life and now you're doing it. But I guess in those initial times, what surprised you the most?

Marie Davey:

Well, after 39 years of nursing, you think you know everything. Yeah, a bit like being a teenager I went right and I thought I knew everything. And then I realised I knew nothing about remote nursing or indigenous people, rheumatic heart disease. I knew nothing. How do you get it? How do you treat it? Yeah, I was horr. How do you get it, how do you treat it? Yeah, I was horrified that we were jabbing people with penicillin injections because they had a sore throat.

Marie Davey:

Oh wow, I'd just come from working, also in an after hours clinic that you know, predominantly you got a lot of sore throats and earaches because that's when mum and dad got home from work and the kids were sick, yeah, and couldn't wait till tomorrow. So we used to see a lot of those. You'd be giving them oral antibiotics, but not in the NT, yeah, because if you don't treat them with that penicillin they're going to get rheumatic heart disease. And what about?

Sam Miklos:

with, like you were saying there in that cultural awareness piece, because you hadn't worked with First Nations people. How was that transition for you?

Marie Davey:

Look, I personally didn't have a big problem with the cultural side of it. I don't know. I just treat everybody the same and I've learned to have a few jokes with people and I've learnt to be a bit crazy. My uniform dress I wear long compression socks, some of them have got unicorns on them and some of them have got flamingos, and I've just been given a pair that have got giraffes on them. I tend to find I can be a bit of an icebreaker.

Kate Coomber:

I can be a bit of an icebreaker. I can walk into a room that's serious and suddenly they're all pointing at that nurse and look at her, she's crazy.

Marie Davey:

It just changes the whole dynamics of it. So culturally I haven't really said I just love it. Every community I've been to is different because it's, you know, a different clan or a different area, so they have different cultural things that are relevant to their area.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah.

Marie Davey:

And so it's amazing to be able to talk to people and you know what? Happens here and what happens there and yeah, yeah.

Kate Coomber:

And having worked across quite a few communities now in those years, do you look back and think this is the impact that I've had? Or, you know, can you really see the impact of you going into that community?

Marie Davey:

Unfortunately, you don't see a big impact. But I think what keeps me going is that I know it's the little steps. Yeah, like every baby, I do an immunization for I know that child is not going to grow up with hepatitis b. Yeah, it's not going to get cirrhosis of the liver from that hepatitis b and it's not going to get cancer from the hepatitis b and that is huge impact it might not feel like day-to-day, but that is, yeah, that is significant, and that it might not feel like day to day, but that is, yeah, that is significant.

Marie Davey:

And that's the other advantage that I find with doing the eight weeks is that it gives you long enough to build rapport with the people in that community as well. Yeah, and so they might have been a bit reluctant to get those needles done, but four weeks down the track they've seen you a couple of times and they now trust you and okay, we'll have that. Yeah, we'll do that.

Marie Davey:

So I was just gonna say go on, no, go on, you go so you know it's not major inroads into any of the closing the gap stuff, but you've got to look at the little things that do make a difference.

Sam Miklos:

Yeah, yeah, that one step at a time. Marie, what advice, then, would you give? You know, if an RN's considering that step into remote area nursing, what are the things that they should be aware of? Maybe the things you wish you knew before you went going? You know what are the benefits, but then what are the challenges? Because you know, like you said, if you have, if you don't have, the greatest first experience, you might not want to go back. So what should they be aware of?

Marie Davey:

that they don't know everything. They need to ask questions. They need to be really that new nurse again and just ask, ask, ask. You cannot assume anything. The minute you start assuming you know what you're doing, you're going going to end up in trouble. Yeah, it's so much easier to fix things before it's a problem. Yeah, then after you create one, yeah. So yeah, definitely, if anyone is considering it, go for it because it is just, it's life-changing to me. Yeah, yeah, apart from what I might be contributing to the community, it's life-changing to the nurses that get out there, and you know, I've met so many beautiful people. It sounds like To see our beautiful country and I'm getting paid to do that.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah, it sounds, you know, like a really connected community we're going to discuss with you. I've heard that sometimes attracting people to these communities, isolation, can be a problem or a barrier for people to think that they can go out there. But we understand that you take Peter with you, is that right? Yeah, on contract, you know, I guess that that maybe solves that problem there. But what do you think about that? Or what's been the accommodation like? Has it been difficult to bring him with you, or is it not a problem?

Marie Davey:

Hasn't been a problem for me at this point in time. Mind you, my next contract. I won't have him with me because he's in the US at the moment. Okay, but that's because we've now got such a good life balance that I'm volunteering to go and help a friend in America.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah, because I think sometimes when people are going to a hospital setting, perhaps the accommodation isn't available for them to take a partner. But when you're going remote you've got that opportunity a lot of the time to take a partner, which maybe is something people don't realise and think it might be out of bounds for them because of that, but in most cases do you find that that's possible Very?

Marie Davey:

very possible, and if there's not work? Pete's never been without work in a community.

Sam Miklos:

What sort of work does he do? What does he do?

Marie Davey:

Yeah, tell us about that. Well, mostly he's managed to get work in the clinics, either as a driver or as a gardener or a cleaner. He painted the clinic at Daly River.

Marie Davey:

Yeah, I remember that he had not had an update for 25 years and he's managed to gurney and paint the exterior of the clinic for the first time in 25 years. Yeah, wow, on Bathurst Island there wasn't work at the clinic, but he picked up clinic, uh, picked up work with um, one of the women's organizations up there. He was doing some maintenance work for them. Yeah, um, so there is. And like when we're in large amana he could have had six jobs. Oh, my god, you're like a remote power couple. Well, it's just you've got to get out there and make yourself known. Yeah, you know, there's often work at post offices or shops or cleaning of council quarters or you know, none of it's glamorous, no, but it's all contributing, but if you can be, together, then it's great.

Sam Miklos:

And do you do back-to-back contracts? Because I know you're also a part-time grandmother as well and you mentioned there before that this remote area nursing has really allowed you both to have a really great lifestyle. Is it a couple of weeks on, couple of weeks off? Does that? Did that make you nervous as well? Stepping into contract work is there going to be enough work for me? Job security Stepping in.

Marie Davey:

It was terrifying. I've always been an organised person and financially included, and to be throwing in a job here not knowing how much work was available I didn't even know what the pay rate was.

Marie Davey:

I didn't ask when I started. I was too scared. I just wanted to do it and people told me it was okay, so it must have been started. Yeah, yeah, I was too scared, I just wanted to do it and people told me it was okay, so it must have been okay. Yeah, yeah, and so that was terrifying. My first contract was a six-week contract because I figured that I would either love it or hate it in that six weeks. If I hated it, I could hang it out for six weeks. Yeah, if I loved it, it was long enough to get my teeth into it and know that that was what I wanted to do.

Marie Davey:

Um, and no, I don't do back-to-back contracts purely because I do one a while. They come home and see my grandbabies and I've got 12 between us, wow, oh, my goodness. Or we want to travel, so we've been blessed enough. We We've spent a month around Uluru and Alice Springs and done the East and West Macdonald Ranges, we've done the Kimberleys, we've been over to Cairns. You know, we've done lots of travelling apart from coming home. So, and the fact that we're together, doesn't matter where we are, we're together.

Sam Miklos:

Yeah, that's amazing.

Marie Davey:

So, and you know, like my eldest daughter, whose house I'm sitting in at the moment, when are you coming home, mum? You were only going for 12 months and I said, well, I'm not coming home, but she's had a baby nearly two years ago and I could spend seven weeks with her when she had that birth. Yeah, at the moment I'm now home for six weeks. Yeah, I would never have that quality time with these children if I was working a conventional job here.

Sam Miklos:

Yeah, yeah, so special for the grandbabies and your own children, the remuneration of working remote is phenomenal.

Marie Davey:

It's just wonderful. Yeah, that's amazing. So you know it does give you that.

Sam Miklos:

It's given me a far better life-work balance than I would have ever dreamt could possibly be there and the remote area nursing community I know that sort of research is sort of suggesting that the next couple of years a lot of our RANDs will be looking to retire and there's a little bit of a gap in the workforce. How do you think we could attract more RANDs into these roles, or is there anything that we're not doing to get more RANDs into these roles?

Marie Davey:

Unfortunately, that decline in nursing is not just remote.

Kate Coomber:

It's everywhere Across the board Everywhere.

Marie Davey:

It costs too much. They seriously need to think about the hexstead that people end up with. That is a major hurdle. I personally do not have a degree in anything. I've never been to university. I am hospital trained. I did not do a bridging course. I was too scared yeah, still too scared. Lots of certificates but no actual degrees or whatever. So for people to come remote they don't have to have all the pieces of paper that you know lots of degrees or you know population health degrees and all that sort of stuff. So they possibly aren't aware of that either. And I do think that sometimes when you look at job advertisements they're a bit over the top and I think a conversation with people is more important than what's written in an ad.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah, yeah, it sounds like maybe the person who wants to help these communities for the right reasons might be the most important trait when looking for a RAN, or the type of people to go in to this line of work, versus the pieces of paper.

Marie Davey:

Absolutely. But they've also got to realise that they're not going to change the world in a day. Yes, it is those tiny little steps that make the difference. Yeah.

Sam Miklos:

That you know when we talk about the differences when we're remote, you know, if we've got a Gold Coast RN who's going remote, you know I'm sure that they would experience a bit of a shock in terms of the services they've got access to the equipment. Is there anything that you can talk to that point about?

Marie Davey:

No, she's a nurse. Any nurse that is going remote has to be comfortable with their own time. Yep, because you are isolated, you can be in communities where the other nurses want nothing to do with you out of hours, because you've just spent eight hours together. Yeah, yeah, so you have to make your own entertainment. Yeah, I take jigsaws, I read, I crochet yeah, so my port has often got more stuff in it than clothes yeah yeah, and that's with Peter, with me, and I do dot art and things like that.

Marie Davey:

That doesn't weigh a lot and you can't put it. And you've got to be able to get out there and, you know, do a bit of walking or exercise to keep yourself mentally and physically healthy. Yeah, yeah, to keep yourself mentally and physically healthy, yeah, yeah. So, as far as going remote, it's just such an amazing experience and I I can guarantee you 99% of the population would have no idea what it's about. How to get into it. Yeah, I think too that, like, the ongoing professional development you've got to do is very expensive. Yes, so, unless you are going to do almost continuous remote, you couldn't do it, like if you were looking at going remote and thinking because when I first started I thought, oh, maybe I can just do, you know, my three weeks and you will leave. Yeah, but you can't do that because you would only get two stints or three stints in a year or two years and you've paid out thousands of dollars for those meck and reck and so you really have to be that career, Anne.

Marie Davey:

You have to have a career, you have to make it a career to make it worthwhile.

Sam Miklos:

Yeah, Murray looking back on your remote career, is there one moment that really stands out for you? That's been a really memorable moment or something that you think, oh, that was just.

Marie Davey:

No, it's all just been so good in that. To get that work-life balance is just amazing. You know I've delivered a prem baby on Groote Island at 34 weeks. Wow, now, if that mum hadn't had help, she'd have been in trouble. Yeah, I wasn't on my own, granted. You know, when you've got someone in prem lab, you get the whole team in.

Marie Davey:

But I was there and you know, helped her through that and evac'd her on the plane because they still go into Darwin. The prem baby had to go into Darwin but to know you've got it to that plane and that baby is pink and warm and sweet you know it's blood sugar's fine and things like that. There's just so many amazing things that can go wrong. They don't always go wrong, yeah.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah, I guess the research shows the outcomes for remote health versus the access you've got to resources at a metro area, and I think that that just showcases the impact of you and all the healthcare professionals like you who are working in these remote areas, of how you can impact the community. Because you're right, if you weren't there, if the team weren't there, then that's a very different story. So I think everyone's grateful for the work that you do Now today.

Marie Davey:

I'm grateful that it's there because it just yeah, it's changed my life and it's changed Peter's life and down the track, like it's the ripple effect. It's the quality of time I do have with my grandchildren.

Kate Coomber:

Absolutely, absolutely Well. Look, you've clearly had huge impact, particularly in that top end area of Australia over the last few years. We would love this podcast to ensure that every guest has a bit of a platform, I guess, to shine a light on a charity close to your heart. Cmr are donating $500 to that charity during this podcast. What charity would you like to talk to today?

Marie Davey:

I think that should go to Beyond Blue. Mental health and suicide prevention is such a major thing, not just in those top end First Nations communities, but everywhere yeah and I just think that they do such a phenomenal job that that $500 would be well spent with them.

Kate Coomber:

Yeah, thank you. Look, it's so wonderful to not only donate that money but also just raise awareness to these charities that each of our guests are talking to today. So thank you for that. Mari, when I first reached out to you, you responded and said that if you could inspire one nurse from this podcast to work remotely, then this would be worth your time, and I think that there's no doubt that you've certainly done that today, and I'd say, a few more than that too.

Kate Coomber:

So thank you so much for your time. You've been so generous um to share all of your wisdom over the your course of your career.

Sam Miklos:

Thank you so much thank you, too, for what you've contributed to Cornerstone. You know you've been such a just an advocate and and so forthcoming and generous with your time and your thoughts and your ideas and, um, you know you are the frontline right. We learn so much from you and your thoughts and your ideas. And you know you are the frontline right, we learn so much from you and your experience. So we're just so grateful to have equally had the opportunity had you read that email and get back in touch with the team and have that opportunity to work with you all these years. Thank you, thank you, we'll see you soon, hey, thanks, bye, bye-bye, bye. Thanks for listening. Don't forget to share, rate and review. This allows us to reach more people and share more incredible stories. Click the follow or subscribe button to ensure you never miss an episode. Thank you.

People on this episode

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Sam Miklos

Host
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Kate Coomber

Co-host