Dr Sam Martin

02/10/2022

Nearly home now- in beautiful Inverell.
(Hi and thanks for the support to all my patients from Inverell and surrounds over the years)
Made it across the desert in the car and back on the bike. It was a great adventure with great people for a good cause. Will be good to get home though!

24/09/2022

I am in Quilpie for lunch after breakfast at Mitchell on the way to the Simpson desert challenge.
Getting warmer!

https://www.facebook.com/SimpsonDesertBikeChallenge

16/09/2022

I am honoured to have been asked to give a presentation on day surgery total joint replacement to the Secretary of NSW health Susan Pearce on the 1st of October.

I am going to give some insights into the different parts of a program that need to go into it for it to be successful.

There are factors before the surgery including exercise, education and information as well as some logistical and planning components. There are also factors after the surgery like open communication channels.

It is important to highlight that there are also technique related factors that matter too. Some simple things like how and when local anaesthetic is injected really matter for example.

Unfortunately (or fortunately I’m not sure!) I’ll be out of contact, riding in the simpson desert fat bike challenge to raise money for the royal flying doctors on the day of the presentation.

I am going to pre record it and try to answer some questions over satellite sms. Not sure how the ride or the satellite sms will go. At least the prerecorded presentation should be a success!

RFDS Community Fundraising : Make a donation today to support RFDS Community Fundraising

09/09/2022

I am excited and a bit nervous about riding in the Simpson desert 2 weeks from now to raise money for the Royal Flying Doctors Service and the amazing work they do for people living in remote areas.

The Simpson desert challenge is a 5 day cycling race over about 700 sand dunes and 500 km from Birdsville to Purni Bore. It’s going to be quite hard! I hope my knees aren’t too sore. Here is a link for any donations. Thanks!

RFDS Community Fundraising : Make a donation today to support RFDS Community Fundraising

08/09/2022

Congratulations to Emma Jewell who was a recent medical student in Grafton!
The research paper we worked on regarding when to start the new strong blood thinners after hip and knee joint replacement surgery has been accepted for presentation at an international meeting (combined national Nz and Aus meetings)!
Thanks also to Corey Scholes at EBM for support with this project.
It’s great to see ideas and research from the regional and rural setting make waves more widely.

01/08/2022

One of the great things about medicine is teaching and working with junior doctors and medical students.

Emma Jewell is final year medical student from Wollongong that has recently completed a research project with me. Her work may help other orthopaedic surgeons to know when it is safe to start the newer strong blood thinners after joint replacement.

Congratulations to Emma on presenting this research to orthopaedic surgeons at the recent NSW Australian Orthopaedic Association Annual scientific meeting.

10/11/2021

It was great to get the opportunity today to present to other orthopaedic surgeons some of the things we have learned about day surgery total joint replacement.

Our presentation at the national Australian Orthopaedic meeting was well received with some interesting questions.

Thanks and congratulations to co-authors Michel Genon and Amanda Tutty and the team at EBM analytics!

27/09/2021

We had a great visit in the operating theatre yesterday from an Orthopaedic Surgeon and Anaesthetist from another area. They were interested in how joint replacements can be done in a way that hurts less and allows a faster recovery to the point that day surgery is possible.

It was a pleasure to be able to explain how that works and show them that day surgery is not only possible, but that for many patients, it’s actually a more comfortable and better overall experience than the typical longer hospital stay protocols.

The patient experience is the main thing, but lower cost and more efficient use of beds for full hospitals are benefits too. Self funded private patients are also a growing group. Day surgery joint replacement also helps bring the costs down there.

14/09/2021

It has been a challenging and thought provoking 18 months. After a lot of thought, I have decided to resign from Grafton Base Hospital at the end of this year to have more time with my family.

It has been a fantastic 10 years. The journey from the initiation of the orthopaedic service through to the present, where the department is a leading unit in short stay arthroplasty of some national significance has been very rewarding. Thank you for your support throughout.

I will continue to practice in my private rooms in Grafton and surrounds. I will be operating at Baringa Private Hospital, with a continued focus on hip and knee surgery. I also continue working to establish the Grafton Private Hospital.

We will try to minimise any disruption for public patients. Patients who are already on the waiting list will not need to do anything. As far as possible, I will work with the hospital to care for patients that are already booked for surgery. Alternatively, public patients can be offered surgery with one of my excellent colleagues or replacement. Attending the KAHAS clinic remains a very useful way to monitor for any significant deterioration.

After the 31st of December 2021, I won’t be able to fill out booking forms for elective surgery at Grafton Base Hospital any more. We will contact patients who currently have appointments booked next year to explain this and discuss alternatives. We would like to avoid the situation where someone waits for an appointment next year and then finds out the appointment wasn’t useful. Public patients who are waiting to see me, especially those with appointments next year who are considering surgery, are welcome to contact my clinic now to discuss this and how it might affect them.

I hope this will improve my capacity to provide more timely consultations in future.

Please contact me if you have any queries or concerns.

20/08/2021

There is quite a bit of COVID vaccine hesitancy or at least concern and consideration within our communities.

Vaccination really is our only way out of this. The development of these safe and effective vaccines within a short time frame is probably one of the greatest medical miracles ever. It is amazing that previously horrible and rapidly fatal conditions such as metastatic melanoma are now often treatable, but that only really effects patients and loved ones with metastatic melanoma.

The covid vaccines are a breakthrough for all of us. Yes there are (small) risks. There is no effective medical treatment or intervention for anything that doesn’t have a small risk. A COVID vaccine is very safe compared to other medical treatments or interventions. For example the Astra Zeneca vaccine is much safer than a knee replacement.

It’s interesting that sometimes people will gloss over the risks of surgery as something that is accepted so doesn’t need processing, but are concerned about the risks of comparably safe things like regular Panadol or now the covid vaccines.

A world in which COVID was a disease without an effective vaccine really doesn’t bear thinking about. Let’s all get vaccinated. Aim higher than 80%!