Volunteers to touch down at Cardiff Airport
Published: 10 January 2011
A national ambulance volunteer life saving scheme is set to fly high from Wales national airport this year.
The Welsh Ambulance Service is taxiing its Community First Responder scheme down the runway, straight into the heart of Cardiff Airport.
Across Wales there are teams of community first responders, groups of all ages who have taken their experiences and used it to learn new clinical skills to help their fellow people.
They are all trained by the Welsh Ambulance Service, usually a representative from the frontline service in the local area of the team.
Each volunteer who signs up to be a active first responder, learns how to administer basic first aid skills, carry out the recognition of cardiac conditions, cardiopulmonary resuscitation and the use of a defibrillator, in the community and surrounding area in which they live until an ambulance resource reaches the incident to take over.
South East Regional First Responder Officer Tony Rossetti and Barry Community First Responder Bryan Foley touched down at the airport to give the bustling community a slice of what they hope to achieve with the volunteer scheme at the site.
“Cardiff Airport serves close to two million passengers a year, so you can imagine that there is quite a busy community here every day,” Tony said.
“Its almost like a moving village or town population on site, and rurally we have teams looking after people in their home areas so we thought the airport fits the bill for volunteers to look after the community in the building.
Tony added: “We hope to have an active team here early this year to give passengers and workers facing life threatening illnesses while on site a valuable first response. The faster life support skills get to a patient, the better their outlook is, a prognosis all first responders are ready to support.”
Marie Boxall, First Responder Coordinator at Cardiff Airport added, “We are committed to developing the First Responder scheme at the airport and have been greatly encouraged by the interest staff from all companies have shown in taking part. Being trained by the Welsh Ambulance Service has given our team not only the appropriate skills but also the confidence to respond when needed.”