About the Wisdom-Seeking Series
Welcome to the third set of episodes of our Wisdom-Seeking Series, a fortnightly set of 90min workshops for experienced GPs to explore the complicated questions in general practice and mental health care. These fortnightly workshops will run on Monday evenings, beginning at 7:30pm (Sydney time).
Each “episode” will start with 30 minutes of a podcast-style conversation between A/Prof Louise Stone and a guest expert. The remaining 30-60 minutes will involve a group exploration of the topics raised, co-facilitated by the episode hosts. Here, the meat of the discussion will come from you: the participants.
These workshops are not Balint groups, nor case discussions, nor clinical supervision. They are something different altogether. The topics are broad, giving participants a chance to share cases without being focussed on a single case. The format of these episodes is designed to promote mutual curiosity and reflexivity, and to help each other develop more nuanced understandings of our role in managing the mental health of our patients.
About Episode 3: Unfixable Suffering (with A/Prof Saroja Gunasekera)
This week’s episode will discuss unfixable suffering. Some problems are beyond the power of the clinician to address, and the burden of “coping” can strain even the most well-stocked clinical toolkit. How can we help people in the face of the relentless weight of social injustice or seemingly-endless misfortune?How do we deal with bad things happening to good people?
Episode 3 will be co-facilitated by A/Prof Saroja Gunasekera. Saroja is renowned in the medical education community for being creative, thoughtful, and reflective, and for having an extraordinary capacity to compassionately reflect on the lived experience of her clients. Her expertise with both treating patients and coaching colleagues will be invaluable for exploring questions of how we, as clinicians, manage our limitations in the face of unfixable suffering.
Accessing the episode
To participate in this episode, or in our upcoming episodes, register your interest here and you will be provided a link to the sessions.
Sustaining the series
In keeping with our philosophy of valuing our own contributions and expertise, we have decided to compensate the facilitators of this series for their time. To learn more about our rates, or to support this endeavour, visit our donations page here.