PARWICH.ORG

Sue H writes:

I hope the heading has grabbed your attention, as one of our responders had the following predicament last week: when called to an emergency in Brassington in the wee small hours, despite having an address he was unable to locate the house!

Although in Parwich we are lucky enough to have a map, there are some dwellings with the same name. Added to this is the possibility of general befuddledness, especially when just summoned from one’s bed!

So if you ever need to call for an ambulance, Here’s what you should do:

1) Be clear about your address and give extra info to aid locating you ( such as “near the school”)
2) At night, turn on all the lights so that the house stands out
3) If possible, station somebody outside the house to look out for and hail the ambulance / first responders.

General news from the last month is that we have two more volunteers to train to become responders. This is proving to be a veritable rush – but don’t let it deter anyone still considering joining our ranks, since the more we are, the greater coverage we can give to the village and surrounding area.

During our March training session we met Nigel, from Ashbourne ambulance station. I can definitely recall this was his name, as it said so on his pocket and I seem to remember having it drawn to my attention. He has volunteered to attend our training sessions to help us remain focussed on key skills and enhance our knowledge. We need to practise skills on a regular basis and want to draw up some aide-memoires to keep information clear, simple and easy to remember. Nigel will be a real help to us and it is amazing that he will come to us after a busy shift, in his own free time.

Today I have been round the village distributing new pads for the defibulators in our kit. We have to check and renew these and other items which can go “past the sell-by-date”. These are items that we have to buy ourselves as a group and in my next blog post I’ll talk about what we spend our funds on.

Lastly, clarification on emergency incidents that we attend. I must stress that it is not down to ourselves to choose what we are called out for. Due to considerations such as our own safety and well-being, together with insurance issues, we are only dispatched to life threatening emergencies such as chest pain, heart attack and breathing difficulties. We are never sent to traffic accidents, children under 14 or trauma cases (such as blows to the head).

Hopefully this helps people better understand the role we perform as volunteers.