A request to the International Federation of Perioperative Nurses (IFPN), by some nurses in Papua New Guinea led to Kate Woodhead and Phyllis Davis running a workshop in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. They set out to help the perioperative nurses establish their own organisation to advise the government on policy which affected their service, and to serve as a forum for perioperative education and motivation. This article describes the process, the enthusiasm which greeted them and the mechanisms by which the Papua New Guinea Perioperative Nurses Association came into being.

One of the most pleasurable pieces of work which I have undertaken as president of the International Federation of Perioperative Nurses (IFPN) was to be involved in the start of a perioperative organisation for the islands of Papua New Guinea (PNG). The country lies north east of Australia, south of the equator and comprises a string of small islands with the main island being the eastern half of New Guinea Island. The country is dominated by a central spine of high mountains (

Fortunately for me English was spoken by all the nurses, although they spoke to each other in a language called Pidgin, which borrows words from a number of different languages, particularly German and English.

The Lonely Planet Guide (2006) did not give me much comfort when doing my homework before travel. It describes Papua New Guinea by warning of petty crime, banditry and isolated instances of violence, much of it concentrated in Port Moresby, the capital, where it was planned we would be staying.

The first approach from PNG to the IFPN for assistance was to my predecessor, Carolyn Webster, in 2001. This came by way of a letter, which was passed to me for exploration. A number of companies working in the Asia-Pacific Rim were approached to see if they would help IFPN with the project. Funding was eventually identified during a visit to Australia in 2003. Johnson and Johnson Australia agreed to fund a colleague and I to run a workshop for the nurses. Following this offer, a formal proposal was developed and accepted by Johnson and Johnson. During the same conference that funding was offered, following some collaboration with the Australian College of Operating Room Nurses (ACORN), a great many colleagues approached me to share their knowledge of working in perioperative practice in PNG. This helped to understand the potential conditions that we would find there.

A colleague, Phyllis Davis, known to AfPP members for her excellent Daisy Ayris Memorial Lecture in 2002 (Davis 2003), was to travel with me, and coordinate the PNG Project. With hindsight, this was a wise decision as her enthusiasm for the task, as well as her ability to raise further funds linked into the region's medical device companies, has been invaluable. Together we developed a project plan by email as Phyllis lives in Sydney, Australia.

The first, vital element of this plan was to contact PNG's Ministry of Health, chief nursing officer (CNO) and other officials, in order to give the workshop credibility and enable nurses to be given study time to leave their posts for two days. By chance, during the International Council of Nurses Conference in Geneva in 2003,1 met the CNO of Papua New Guinea and told her of the project plan. Soon, we were in regular email contact and she supplied many names and addresses for local hospitals and health officials. Letters were subsequently dispatched.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Phyllis and I booked hotel rooms and a small conference room for the workshop online and made our own travel plans. We finally arrived and were met by the perioperative nurses that had written initially to Carolyn. They were excited that we had arrived, and had spent the morning picking Bougainvillea blossoms and sewing them into welcome garlands with black silk from theatres. After such an extended planning phase, it was wonderful to finally arrive, in May 2004.

The enthusiasm from the nurses was evident when we asked to be shown their operating theatres in the main referral hospital in Port Moresby. Many colleagues approached me to share their knowledge of working in PNG.

The plan had identified that between five and eight local perioperative nurses would attend the two-day workshop to explore and set up, if possible, an organisation which they had expressed a desire to have in the country. Imagine our surprise when 28 nurses showed up! A bit of hasty re-organisation of the room and the catering arrangements had to be done, but otherwise, it was a case of 'the more the merrier!' We were amazed that the hospitals had allowed so many nurses to be present, and many had travelled for hours to get to the capital and attend the event. Indeed, many hospitals had funded their travel and accommodation too.

IDENTIFYING GOALS

We spent the next two days brainstorming: working out the details of membership categories, structure of the organisation, the name and other vital minutiae. The majority of the work was done by small groups, who fed back to all and, with much debating, a consensus was gained. Phyllis and I facilitated the groups, encouraged and motivated where there appeared to be insurmountable problems and wrote endless notes.