Lincoln heart experts to share skills in Sri Lanka

Dinal Taleyratne, Monique Loveday and Prof David O’Brien at the Lincolnshire Heart Centre, at Lincoln County Hospital

Clinicians from a Lincoln hospital have joined a project to improve CPR training in Sri Lanka.

They will travel to South Asia later this month to help develop advanced life-support skills among medical staff.

Consultant cardiologist Dinal Taleyratne, who was born in Sri Lanka, said high-quality resuscitation training was not easily accessible in the country.

Mr Taleyratne, who helped plan the trip, added: "I have always wanted to return and offer my support."

He will be joined by Prof David O’Brien, a fellow consultant cardiologist, and Monique Loveday, a lead resuscitation practitioner.

They will instruct staff on a "train-the-trainer" course, which they have helped to develop, in order to share their knowledge of specialised cardiac care.

It is hoped that the Sri Lankan clinicians who take part in the training will go on to share their knowledge with colleagues at local hospitals around the country.

The trip has been funded by the Lincoln staff outside of NHS budgets.

'Powerful tool'

Ms Loveday said she had a "real passion" for training and was "excited" to be involved in improving skills in Sri Lanka.

She said: “We take so much for granted with the NHS. We have the benefit of its history and all of the hard work and experience that has got us where we are today."

Prof O’Brien has been teaching advanced life support for 25 years, including in China and India.

He said education was a "powerful tool", but Sri Lanka lacked the infrastructure and financial resources to train people in "these vital skills".

Dr Taleyratne said he hoped the Lincoln team would also learn from Sri Lankan colleagues.

"They are creating an exciting programme where resuscitation skills are taught in schools. For a developing country to be doing this when we are not, shows there is a lot we can learn from each other,” he added.

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