Are you thinking about entering the health field? Do you work well in high pressure environments? Perhaps a Bachelor of Paramedicine at Monash could be your calling!
If you want to know more about the degree, you’ve come to the right place! Today we’ll be looking at the core subjects, assessments, culture and many other aspects of the degree.
Let’s get into it!
What is a Bachelor of Paramedicine at Monash?
Core Units for this Degree
How to Get into a Bachelor of Paramedicine at Monash
What’s the Teaching Format?
What’s the Faculty and Culture Like?
What is a Bachelor of Paramedicine at Monash?
A Bachelor of Paramedicine prepares you to become a qualified Paramedic at the completion of a 3-year degree. In the course you gain the necessary skills and knowledge to work in life or death situations, assist people on call, and problem solve through challenging situations in a health and medical context.
“It’s a very practical course, where half your classes are practical… Monash also focusses a lot on theory because of their level of academia and research.” — Ammar, Bachelor of Paramedicine Graduate at Monash
Postgraduate Studies
You can also choose to complete postgraduate studies by doing a fourth year Honours program. This requires you to maintain an average mark of 70% across at least 24 credit points in your third year of undergraduate study.
You can also pursue a Masters in Specialist Paramedic Practice which is a 1.5 year degree that allows you to specialise in different areas of care such as Aeromedical and Retrieval and Intensive Care Paramedic.
Career Paths
Although most students go into a Bachelor of Paramedicine to become a paramedic, there are a range of other career paths in the relevant industries that you could pursue. This includes:
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- First responder
- Basic life support
- Ambulance attendance
- Patient transfer
- Pre-hospital emergency response medic
- Military medic technician
- Emergency medical technician
- Medical attendant
- Non-emergency specialist
Core Units for this Degree
At Monash University, you need to complete a range of core subjects in both Foundation and Paramedicine Studies. To give you a taste of what you would learn in this degree, here are just three of the subjects that you would have to take in first and second year.
BMA1011 – Foundations of Anatomy and Physiology for Health Practice 1
As the name of this unit suggests, you focus on the anatomy and structure of the human body. You learn about the range of bodily functions that are interrelated and develop a strong understanding of the musculoskeletal and nervous systems.
PAR1032 – Paramedicine in the Australian Health Care System
To work as a paramedic in Australia, you need to have a thorough understanding in public health care and the different policies and programs available to patients. There is also a focus on the funding, aged care and disability services in place.
PAR2022 – Paramedic management of trauma conditions
This second year subject expands on some of the foundational clinical units taken in first year. It looks into common injuries across patients and how these can be prevented. You also gain clinical skills in fast, on-the-spot problem solving.
Since the structure of the degree is quite rigid, there are no majors or specialisations you can pursue. This means that everyone studying Paramedicine at Monash will be taking on the same subjects.
Some of the other foundational units include Foundations of Anatomy and Physiology for Health Practice 2, Introduction to Paramedic Research and Evidence, Foundations of Paramedic Practice 1 & 2, as well as Foundation Paramedic Clinical Practice.
The rest of the subjects that you’ll be taking on are:
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- Health and Disease Across the Lifespan
- Professionalism in Paramedic Practice
- Paramedic Advanced Life Support
- Paramedic Management of Cardiovascular and Respiratory Conditions
- Pharmacotherapy in Paramedic Practice
- Paramedic Management of Mental Health
- Paramedic Management of Medical Conditions
- Extended Paramedic Care
- Paramedic Emergency Management
- Clinical Education and Leadership in Paramedic Research and Practice
- Integrated Clinical Practice
- Paramedic Management of Maternal and Neonatal Health
- Paramedic Management of Acute Conditions Affecting Special Populations
Work Placements
Industry and work placements are a requirement from the state service. Therefore, you gain a whole load of practical and field experience working in hospital and health care environments.
“I did around 4 weeks with Ambulance Victoria where I was shadowing a crew. So it was two, 2-week blocks inside the ambulance and this is standard across all the universities.
“Only Monash does hospital placement, placements in the emergency department, critical care units, maternity ward, and surgery, and these are opportunities you rarely get as a Paramedic student.” — Ammar
How to Get into a Bachelor of Paramedicine at Monash
To get into Paramedicine at Monash, you need an ATAR of 75 for guaranteed entry.
However, there are a range of pathways and admission schemes that you could consider as alternatives, and these vary depending on your personal circumstances. There is the Monash Indigenous Entry Scheme which lowers the ATAR requirements depending on different degrees.
You could also look to complete a relevant diploma at the Monash College to then apply for a Bachelor of Paramedicine. You can also complete a single unit study which allows you to do relevant subjects that have lesser requirements, before enrolling into the actual degree.
What are the prerequisites?
In order to get into a Bachelor of Paramedicine through your ATAR you need to have completed both English and Mathematics in high school.
For English, you’ll need to have achieved a study score of at least 30 in English (EAL) or 25 in English other than EAL for Units 3 & 4.
For Maths, you should have a study score of at least 22 in Mathematical Methods (any) or Specialist Mathematics, or a score of at least 25 in Further Mathematics for Units 3 & 4.
Requirements
Although there are no additional exams or assessments that need to be completed, there are a couple requirements needed.
Firstly, a police check must be conducted alongside a Working With Children Check. This is largely due to the compulsory work placements throughout the degree.
You are also required to have your vaccines or immunisations and undergo a health check to ensure you are fit for the work placements.
Scholarships
The main scholarship available to Paramedicine students at Monash is the Ric (Frederic) Bouvier Scholarship (also known as the Sir John Monash Fee Scholarship) which is a $9000 scholarship awarded to two students to contribute to their fee and tuition payment at the university.
The students are chosen based on academic achievements, having maintained a weighted average mark (WAM) of 70 or above, alongside an interview.
There are also a range of other scholarships available depending on your personal circumstances. You can find out more through the Monash University scholarship search!
What’s the Teaching Format?
Monash Uni follows a semester model, where you complete four subjects each semester on a full-time load — totalling to 8 subjects a year.
Class Structure
For practical units, you tend to have 2 hour lectures and 3 hour classes.
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- Lectures: You focus on learning content from areas such as cardiology and respiratory, maternity, trauma, and CPR.
- Tutorials: You revise the lecture in terms of content and then rotate through different scenarios in the classroom. In each scenario you have to figure out what treatment is most suitable based on the area that is currently being taught in lectures.
“You’re constantly doing scenarios! So it’s upwards of 6 hours of scenarios a week.” — Ammar
For theory based units, you will have a 1 to 2 hour lecture and 2 hour tutorial.
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- Lectures: Focussed on course content and learning the theory behind different areas in health.
- Tutorials: Interactive classes that extend on lecture content. You also go through more applicational activities and working with scenarios to see how they are relevant to working in the industry.
“It depends on the subject — sometimes you’re just learning content, such as Pharmacology where you rote-learn drugs, their use, the side effects, etc… But Monash is really good at finding the best way for us to learn.
“You go through things like emotional intelligence, how to break bad news to patients, dealing with your own mental health, or patients suffering from domestic abuse.” — Ammar
How much time do you spend in class?
Depending on the number of theory or practical based subjects you take, the contact hours will vary. Generally speaking, you can expect to be in classes 16 to 20 hours a week.
Assessments
As you’re completing a variety of practical and theoretical subjects, the assessments vary for Paramedicine at Monash.
You can expect a fair few written exams at the end of each semester for most of your subjects, if not all of them.
You also complete OSCEs (Objective structured clinical examination) which are practical exams that test your ability to apply course content to scenarios on the spot. You are examined on the choice of treatment you use for the patient and your ability to demonstrate your understanding of the concepts and techniques taught in that unit.
“For OSCEs, which are your practical exams, you come into uni, get given a scenario and give treatment. It’s a pass or fail, and if you fail you get a second chance.” — Ammar
Skills You Refine and Learn
As Paramedicine is a particularly practical degree, you gain a whole range of applicational skills that are incredibly relevant to the health and medical industry.
Decision Making Under Pressure
You gain situational awareness where you can understand a situation by being in it, to then have a holistic perspective on what the next step is to solving a problem.
Problem Solving
It’s as simple as, “What’s the best way to diagnose someone, under pressure.” —Ammar
Understanding Different Areas of Emergency Help
While paramedics are focussed on the health and medical aspects of emergency services, you also learn why someone may dial triple zero.
“You look at all elements of emergency help — cardiac, respiratory related, disease, infections, trauma, car accidents, mental health. You cover all these areas.” — Ammar
Clinical-based reasoning
“With Monash, we don’t just learn how to do things but why… we learnt that things are never black and white.” — Ammar
Essentially, it’s important to have an in-depth and thorough understanding of different medical and emergency situations. So, when you’re applying a treatment on a patient, you know what treatment to use, and what would be most effective, given the situation.
Research
You learn about almost every area of health, because paramedics need to be equipped with the knowledge and skills to treat any medical emergency. You learn about anatomy, pharmacology, and so much more!
“Everything we do is emphasised on evidence based practise, reading the evidence and being part of a research project.” — Ammar
What’s the Faculty and Culture Like?
Faculty
The faculty for Paramedicine at Monash is incredibly experienced, so all the lecturers and tutors are either previous paramedics, Masters or PhD students, or are currently working as a paramedic.
“Your tutors are people who are still currently paramedics, so you hear exactly what’s happening and they have a wealth of experience and wisdom.” — Ammar
Culture
As Paramedicine is a very structured degree, you’re with the same cohort throughout the course. So you become familiar with your peers, and develop a close knit bond with those in your classes.
Societies
The main society for this degree at Monash is ParaSoc — the Paramedic Society. ParaSoc runs a whole range of events throughout each semester, are a great support network for students, and provide a number of networking opportunities.
There are also study groups, cruises and an end of year ball, which are great chances to meet students from other year levels.
Programs
For study help and guidance, Near Peer is a program run by Monash specifically for first year students. It allows second or third year students to volunteer their time for first year classes to help students with any difficulties they may be facing in the subject.
“With Monash in general, they provide a lot of academic support through the library, whether it’s help with referencing, access to a lot of literature and updates of opportunities and jobs that are coming through.” — Ammar
And that’s essentially the basis to a Bachelor of Paramedicine at Monash — and hopefully this gives you a better idea of whether or not this degree is for you!
Interested in the pros and cons of the degree? Check out our article here!
Nandini Dhir is a Content Writer at Art of Smart and is currently studying a Bachelor of Arts (majoring in Marketing) and a Bachelor of Advanced Studies (Media and Communications), as a Dalyell Scholar, at Sydney University. She enjoys covering local issues in her area and writing about current events in the media. Nandini has had one of her pieces published in an article with the Sydney Morning Herald. In her free time, Nandini loves doing calligraphy, ballet, and sewing, or is otherwise found coddling her cats.
