I was proud and thrilled to have my Rotary:Ambulance Vic protégée from the Leadership Mentoring Program of 2020 present her project for the program to us on Monday night, so this report is unashamedly biased.
Our twelve months together was a bit protracted, as Olivia and her husband were away volunteering n the Buliisa District – north west of Uganda for a month at the commencement in July 2019 and our latter months were limited to phone and ZOOM contact due to COVID. Olivia was selected to present to the Leadership team in April and as I watched her on zoom, noted how it seemed to excite them.
Olivia is busy, as she is about to return to her role as Team Manager of Kew Branch (which services the Boroondara Local Government Area and surrounding suburbs and normally manages 35-40 staff in varying stages of their ambulance career). However, for the past 12 months she has been actively involved in Ambulance Victoria’s Emergency Management Unit supporting and focusing on managing the COVID-19 response. In addition, she is now undertaking a Masters in Disaster and Emergency Response through Edith Cowan University. Olivia came to the ambulance service after ten years as a nurse in the Alfred Hospital’s Emergency Department, wanting to get closer to the pointy end of trauma.
When we first met, Olivia had several ideas for her program project and had been constantly moving through the ranks in acting positions. She was kind enough to say I helped her focus on a smaller (and now profoundly beneficial community outcome) project and filter her career plan in a way which has helped her feel more settled.
Olivia’s project was to take a series of ten health information pages (for patients who are attended, but who are deemed suitable to remain at home instead of being transported to a facility), from hard copy to APP format. She explained that, along the way, she was successful in receiving an additional AV grant to cover the considerable tech costs of bring the work to fruition, and the complex journey she had in making it happen. Olivia wisely researched the reasons for under-use of the health information which has guided her plan for roll-out and embedding use of the APP in the Paramedics treatment armoury. The difference will be that this cohort of patients, instead of being expected to comprehend a quick verbal message from the attending ambulance officer, they can lock onto a QR code to download, or receive by email an explanatory form to explain their specific illness and next steps for themselves and their family or carers. A future plan will expand the information into the most common non-English languages used in Victoria, as 25% of call outs are to non-English speaking patients.
Olivia is a delightful young woman, and is passionately making the ambulance service a better place to work and improving its effectiveness. I look forward to watching her impact grow and her influence expand.
Gilly