Informative Episiotomy Workshop for IMU Medical Students

The episiotomy workshop for Semester 10 medical students was held in IMU Kluang Clinical Campus on 21 December 2019 under the guidance of Advisor, Prof Dato’ Sivalingam Nalliah and A/Prof Kavitha a/p Naglanda along with Supervisor and Facilitator, Dr Hussein AKL. The workshop was successfully held in association with B Braun who provided the participants with the required suture materials and models. A total of 26 students, including the organising committees, 15 from Kluang and 11 from Batu Pahat campuses attended this workshop. This workshop was an initiative from Dr Hussein AKL to train and teach the Semester 10 students the proper way of performing episiotomy, techniques of repairing the episiotomy and also the wound care after episiotomy.

At the end of this workshop, the participants are expected to:
1. Know the relevant anatomy of female perineum
2. Understand indications and complications for episiotomy
3. Learn techniques of performance for episiotomy repair
4. Gain knowledge and skills required for competently performing episiotomy (eg. methods of handling surgical instruments, knot tying, interrupted and continuous suturing method)
5. Know instruments required for episiotomy repair
6. Get hands-on practices and gain experience to the procedure as close to real clinical scenarios using simulated models
7. Learn types of perineal tears
8. Learn the care of perineum in postpartum period
9. Understand medico-legal issues related to episiotomy
10. Know importance of proper documentation and verbal consent taking

The event started with an opening speech delivered by Rasheedat Wuraola Akande, a student representative. She initiated the beginning of episiotomy workshop by inviting June Gue Jun Hua, representative from B Braun to give a talk about suturing materials. It covered the types of sutures, type of knots and the importance of selecting the right suture in hospital care. She ended her presentation by playing a video of episiotomy repair on a model which lasted for 7 minutes. Dr Hussein AKL represented IMU Kluang Clinical Campus in giving out the token of appreciation to June.

Dr Hussein AKL, supervisor and facilitator of this workshop, continued the workshop with a session in episiotomy. He discussed the anatomy of the perineal area, along with types, indications, complications and postnatal care for episiotomy. Moreover, he shared a few interesting and important aspects of episiotomy such as history of episiotomy, types and techniques of episiotomy cut with repair and complications of episiotomy. Dr Hussein AKL also gave us an important lesson regarding 3rd and 4th degree perineal tear. He explained on how to manage and repair 3rd and 4th degree care which would benefit the medical students as houseman in the future.

Lastly, Dr Hussein AKL reinforced the importance of ethics and medico-legal issues related to episiotomy. Interaction between students and facilitator occurred throughout the session and participants indeed had a fruitful discussion especially on medico-legal issues. This session ends with a 7 minutes’ video explaining episiotomy repair and steps on a patient.

Prior to the clinical practice session, Dr Hussein AKL demonstrated episiotomy repair using an episiotomy model. He demonstrated the techniques of suturing vaginal mucosa, perineal muscle and the skin. It was an informative demonstration where students got to review their basic knowledge prior to hands-on experience. The next session was the hands-on session where students practiced their skills on the models provided. Dr Hussein guided the students step by step, teaching different types of sutures to be applied while repairing different parts of the wound. Throughout the session, Dr Hussein guided the students on episiotomy repair, steps to avoid injuries on vaginal and anal sphincter plus technique of tying a suture knot single handed. On the whole, the participants found that the workshop was very beneficial as it was difficult for some of them to carry out an episiotomy repair on a real patient. For future events, it would be beneficial if this workshop is done at the beginning of Semester 10 to provide for a wider audience.

Prepared by Ng Ai Chian, Event Officer of Internal and External Liaison, IMU Clinical Campus Kluang

Organising Committee

Name	Position
Prof Dato’ Sivalingam A/L Nalliah	Advisor
A/Prof Kavitha A/P Naglanda	Advisor
Dr Hussein AKL	Supervisor and Facilitator
June Gue Jun Hua	B Braun Representative
Hemaprakash A/P Periyathamby	President 2019/2020
Leong Piem Jie	Event Manager
Ng Ai Chian	Event Officer of Internal & External Liaison
Rasheedat Wuraola Akande	Event Secretary
Siti Haidah Binti Mohamed Fuzi	Event Officer of Logistics
Sister Koh Jeek Hong Hafizah Haniem Binti Che Hasim	Staff support for the event