Zivildienst

First-Aid Volunteer

Since the end of my alternative military service (that is to say, since February 1, 2001) I am a first-aid volunteer at the Arbeiter-Samariter-Bund Floridsdorf-Donaustadt (ASB 921).

I am obliged to take over at least six shifts every year at the ASB Floridsdorf-Donaustadt as well as four shifts at the ASB-Bundesorganisation (1150 Vienna, Hollergasse 2-6). Whereas I exceeded these requirements during the first six month of my membership (with one shift per week on the average), my commitment has since somewhat diminished. In the whole first year of my voluntarily activity, however, I have still reached tree shifts per month on the average (that is to say, a total of 367½ hours). In 2002, I have just managed to meat the requirements concerning one shift every quarter, whereas in 2003, I have only worked on two days during the whole year – and these were the last days of work at the ASB for me to date.

Most of my work consists of working in the ambulance service. Still, I also worked at events such as the Vienna City Marathon and the Donauinselfest.

Apart from every-day work, it is of course also necessary to train some more unusual situationen in order to renew one's knowledge of first aid. Therefore, I participated in an exercise of the ASB Floridsdorf-Donaustadt in October 2001, where we trained to rescue and vet the injured after a (not really severe) train accident.
Moreover, I started with a 160-hour training as an emergency paramedic in order to improve my skills even further. This training was rather time-consuming (especially during spring 2002), which was (apart from my also rather time-consuming studies) one cause for my minor commitment. Unfortunately, I was not able to finish this training with the required exam because of lack of time due to my studies. Nonetheless, I have learned quite a lot during the lectures which might come in handy during my future shifts.

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