News - Train the Trainers- Brazil, November 2007

On the 4 th of November 2007 I started my expedition to South America.

I arrived in Sao Paulo, the world's third largest city with over 10 million inhabitants after a 10 hour day flight from Johannesburg. I didn't get out of the airport to explore Sao Paulo on foot, but I was overwhelmed by the sheer size the city as seen from the air. Unfortunately, my afternoon flight to Rio was delayed by several hours mainly due to a backlog of planes due to inclement weather the previous day. In fact Dr Damon Bizos who was part of the South African contingent – as part of the Faculty of train the trainers- had flown the day before only to be diverted to Rio, which was his final destination. However he then had to fly back from Rio to Sao Paulo to clear customs only to fly back to Rio later! So I considered myself lucky even though I arrived in Rio at 01h30 the following morning. Dr Douglas Stupart from Cape Town, was the last to make up the South African trio and because he arrived later managed to miss the delays caused by the weather.

It was testament to the organizational skills of the Trainer the Trainer organizers that, much to my relief, I had my personal chauffeur waiting in arrivals in the early hours of Sunday morning. I was then taken by car, in the pouring rain, to our resort- “Hotel do Frade & Golf Resort” in Angra dos Reis- located 155km South of Rio on the warm, West side of the Atlantic ocean.

The Train the Trainers workshop in Angra dos Reis, which was co-organised with the Brazilian Federation of Gastroenterology and Prof. Jaime Eisig, started that evening with a welcome reception where along with Caipirinhas- a traditional Brazilian cocktail, the aims of the week were presented to the 46 gastroenterologists from all around the world including Nigeria, Pakistan, Korea, Estonia, Finland, Taiwan, Poland, Germany and Australia, to mention but a few.

Train the Trainers is an educational workshop aimed at imparting modern methods of teaching, and in so doing aims to create better educators in gastroenterology. World wide it has been recognized that traditional approaches to pre and post-graduate training in medicine have major short comings. For example it has been shown that average retention rates during a normal lecture are in the region of about 5% when introducing a new topic. This can be increased up to 50% by using a group discussion and up to 80% if one is doing the teaching or leading the discussion oneself.

By bringing trainers together from across the world in intensive and interactive 4 day workshops, the World Gastroenterology Organization (WGO) has developed a forum for interaction between educators in gastroenterology, for the sharing of experience and the discussion of common problems.

The workshop was arranged in 17 modules over 4 days including “traditional” lectures, group discussions and presentations and teaching “hands-on” procedural skills- hands on. Topics covered included an introduction to adult education, evidence based medicine, critical appraisal, credentialing, interpersonal skills and team working, trial design and publishing, web searches and presentation skills.

The cultural events that were arranged were enthusiastically supported and provided an insight into other countries traditions and ways of life and were a way of breaking the ice between gastroenterologists from different backgrounds. It was also, in a way, reassuring to hear about other countries medical issues and realize that the grass is not much greener elsewhere.

We had time to visit Parati, a local historical town founded in 1531 and which acted as the major South American port to ship gold back to Portugal in the 1700s. Unfortunately there was no time to play golf on the first golf resort in Brazil, but I did manage one early morning jog along the golf course and into the “Atlantic Rain forests” where I was impressed with the Brazilian wildlife and even got to see the Capybara- the world's largest rodent (as seen on Discovery Channel and eaten by anacondas).

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the organizers from WGO, Prof. Jaime Eisig and the Brazilian Federation of Gastroenterology for bringing together such an enthusiastic international Faculty for this Train the Trainers workshop. I hope to put into practice the principals of education and academic gastroenterology I was exposed to during the week. Thanks to Department of Medicine, WITS University, for sponsoring flights to South America and to SAGES and especially Karin Fenton for facilitating this very worthwhile learning experience.

Peter Barrow, Johannesburg General Hospital



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