President’s Report
Dear Members,
2021/2022 continues to be challenging with the ever-present pandemic! QONSIG has again risen to the challenge providing education and support to its members online and through newsletters. I was sorry to have missed the AGM this evening in conjunction with an education evening – our first face to face for a while! The ANZONA conference to be held in Adelaide in September will be another step in the road back to normality.
QONSIG are looking forward to hosting the next ANZONA conference here in Brisbane in 2024.
A massive thank you to all the hard-working QONSIG committee members for your valuable contributions. Special thanks to Kath and Tallulah who keep the QONSIG wheel turning!
Finally thank you to all the QONSIG members for your continued support and love of all things orthopaedic!
Kind Regards,
Kirsty Firman
QONSIG President 2021-2022
President’s Report
Dear Members,
This will be my last report as president, as many of you know I retired from my nursing career in April this year but I hope to continue as a committee member in both the QONSIG and ANZONA committees.
I am sure this past year has presented many problems for you all with the ever present COVID-19. I would like to thank you all for your continued support to QONSIG, by becoming a member, attending the zoom meetings and education nights, reading the newsletters and attending our conference earlier this year.
These past few years we have been blessed with a very active, passionate and devoted committee that has seen them pull together to achieve the outcomes they have for our members. I would like thank them all for their efforts support during this difficult year.
Our membership numbers have reached 168 and this is the highest volume we have ever had. We set our target for 100 and have exceeded all our expectations. I hope that you will all renew your memberships and that we continue to grow as a group. Our newsletter has been greatly received and I thank the team for their editing skills and the articles they have researched. I know I enjoy reading them when they are sent out and still learn something new.
Due to Covid restrictions we have had to hold most of our meetings and any education nights by zoom. I would like to thank ANZONA for sharing with us the many zoom education nights, conference dates and the invitations to join various meetings. I know some members have taken advantage of this and we have received good feedback.
We continued to support the Australian Catholic University by donating a book prize to the value of $200 to a student nurse in their first year of nursing who has excelled in their basic nursing care.
Working for our members we reviewed and upgraded our website. We introduced a new system for membership payment and we now use the company Eventbrite to assist with the enrolment of education nights.
Leading up to our QONSIG Conference, which we had to reschedule from March 2020 to March 2021, we had many meetings and I have to say we had many nervous days wondering if things would go ahead due to the ever changing environment. We all stayed positive and on 6th March we had a hundred people attend the Grand Chancellor for our Conference. We received amazing feedback for attendees and we were so glad we could declare this day a success. We had a varied program which seemed to please the members. We had networking after the conference for those that could stay.
In June we held a Wound Care Education Evening at Victoria Park. This was well attended as we had a 50 attendee limit. This was catered for by QONSIG and once again we received good feedback and I would like to thank the speakers and Mölnlycke for their wonderful support.
I would like to encourage as many members as possible to attend the ANZONA Conference this October in Adelaide. Please check our website for the details and program. It will be a thrilling three days with many networking opportunities.
We continue with our plans for education nights this year and in 2022 for two half day workshops, one to be held at The Gold Coast and the other in MacKay.
I would like to close by saying this has been a very challenging year for myself and the committee but this has been by far the most rewarding. I would like to wish the incoming President and Committee good luck in the 2021-2022 year ahead.
With kind regards,
Sheila Gilritchie
QONSIG President 2020-2021
President’s Report
Dear Members,
Well the 2019-2020 year is one we will not forget and to quote so many people it has been “unprecedented”. From our AGM in August 2019 to the present day we have had to become a committee of readjustment and change. We started the year with so many plans for 2019 and 2020 with workshops to be held in Toowoomba and Bundaberg and our Conference to be held in Brisbane in March 2020. We decided as a committee to cease the speaker nights and focus on short workshops to give our members the best opportunity at networking and accumulating CPD points. We also felt the Newsletter was something very important and informative that we could do for our members and share the specialized work that we do as Orthopaedic Nurses. Tallulah is our Editor-in-chief with Kath as her very able assistant and we thank them both for their tireless work with this project.
As 2019 came to an end we saw our member numbers increase due to the fantastic work being done to promote the Conference. As the time for the Conference drew closer and developments of Covid-19 began to change our social distancing and meetings, sadly we had to put on hold our plans for workshops and the Conference. We did still manage to meet 4 times this year but like everyone else had to adhere to all the rules.
We have carried over our membership to 2021 with the re-planning of the Conference to March 2021. Our speakers are once again locked in and it looks like it will be an exciting program. Stay tuned for details related to the Conference. As a President my goal was always to achieve a membership of one hundred and thanks to the wonderful, tireless and enthusiastic committee, we now have one hundred and thirty-five members to date!!! We are part of ANZONA and I am proud to say we have the biggest membership of any of the 6 chapters. Well done everyone and stick with us as 2020-2021 is shaping up to be full of wonderful things to do.
In closing I would like to say a huge thank you to my wonderful committee. These women give up their time after a busy day at work, attend meetings, come up with amazing ideas and still have to go home and carry out these projects. I thank you for your support and never-failing enthusiasm. I hope that as a team we can see all our plans come to fruition in the year to come. I would encourage anyone who would like to join our QONSIG Committee to do so as many minds make brilliant ideas!
Stay safe out there.
Kind regards,
Sheila Gilritchie
QONSIG President 2019-2020
President’s Report
Dear Members,
I thought that the previous year was exciting and busy, but this year has surpassed it! Our Committee have done an amazing job. I would like to thank them for their enthusiasm, feedback, support, tireless hard work and new innovative ideas.
We have introduced our Newsletter, revamped our Facebook page, website, ticket purchasing for speaker nights to name but a few amazing changes. Our next big venture is to increase our numbers of members for the coming year and to plan the 2020 QONSIG Conference to be held at The Chancellor in Brisbane.
This past year we have had speaker night at SAWMH, TPCH, St Andrews Ipswich and St Vincent’s Northside. We ventured out to St Andrews Toowoomba for a morning workshop which was great fun and well attended. Toowoomba made QONSIG feel very welcome. We also assisted to help plan and organise a day workshop held and hosted at The Mater Hospital, Townsville. Once again, the Committee attended and had a great time networking with other Orthopaedic staff. Our two ventures far afield.
I would like to mention our friends at Mölnlycke, Cardinal Health, Abbot, and Covidien for their continued support and sponsorship with lovely suppers, nibbles and drink. Showing us their new and innovative products is always exciting.
I am sure many of you feel as I do that the year is disappearing before our very eyes but we still as a group have a lot to do and look forward to our to do list for the coming year. We look forward to our speaker nights, networking and venturing to new venues.
I would like to thank the outgoing committee once again for their tireless energy, attention to detail and wonderful support and friendship over the last year.
I am looking forward to our Conference and the year to come.
Thanks,
Sheila Gilritchie
QONSIG President 2018-2019