By Mikayla van Loon
Since he was a young boy, Fill Pritchett has been involved in the St John Ambulance Victoria service after following in the footsteps of his family.
Now 33 years later, Fill continues to play a vital role in the Yarra Ranges division as a Deployment and Readiness Regional Officer.
Using his experience and knowledge, Fill is encouraging other people across the shire to join the ranks and volunteer.
Beginning to volunteer with St John at just eight-years-old, Fill said it all began by just tagging along with his mum.
“I used to go along with mum and was interested in it and the joining age was eight back then so I was allowed to join as a junior cadet,” he said.
With his grandfather, siblings and mother all involved in some capacity over the years, a deep sense of duty to give back to the community was instilled in Fill.
From what used to be primarily a first aid service, Fill said St John has changed to being a major support to Ambulance Victoria paramedics.
“There’s been a huge change over the years. I’ve watched the introduction of defibs into St John, and outside of the ambulance service, basically. They were the holy grail when we first got them, no one was allowed to touch them unless you were highly trained,” he said.
“Even now we’ve gone from just being everyone’s first aiders, l we’ve got all different levels of scope now. So first aiders, first responders, advanced responders, and then healthcare professionals within the organisation.”
Fill said aside from the equipment St John now has access to, the responders are also more highly trained in providing medications
“It used to be that we had Panadol and that was it. Now, we’ve seen the introduction of methoxyflurane, which is the green whistle and then from that we’ve gone to GTN, which is a cardiac drug, adrenaline for anaphylaxis…It has really changed over the years.”
Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, Fill said St John Ambulance was relied heavily on to reach patients and staff the state’s overrun emergency ambulance service.
“We’ve seen a huge reliance on StJohn over Covid times. So we actually had St John volunteers drive ambulances so they could get enough ambulances on the road.
“We’d have a St John volunteer with an AV paramedic and that would be the crew and they’d be on normal jobs for Ambulance Victoria.”
Day to day St John Ambulance volunteers provide services at large community events and particularly in times of emergency, whether it be fires or floods.
Local festivals and sporting events have been a major focus of Fill’s throughout his time with the ambulance service, taking on extra duties to coordinate other volunteers.
“I’ve had a huge focus on that personally. So I’ve been involved with looking after Rochford Winery for the last 20 years. I’m actually the St John venue manager out there now.”
With the new regional role in deployment and readiness, Fill said it involves looking “after all of our assets for deployment, whether it’s planned or unplanned, so whether it’s a local concert, or whether it fires and floods”.
Having been involved in a number of emergency events, Fill said he’s always loved being able to support people in their time of need.
“I love being involved with the emergency deployment with the fires and floods and stuff like that. It’s unpredictable.
“It’s trying to get people out and assist where people have lost houses or been displaced from houses, or whether it’s helping the firefighters come back off the fire ground, that’s always been a huge interest of mine.”
With 12 active members in the Yarra Ranges division of St John Ambulance, Fill said the pandemic did have an impact on volunteer numbers but with demand for their service being so high they are currently recruiting volunteers to increase the number to 20 members.
Currently the team has three other long-standing volunteers in Tom Clarke, Diane Dickson, and Gerard Guerin making up 115 years experience in total.
No prior experience is required, with all the training being supported by St John.
“If you sign up for St John, they’ll cover your initial first aid courses and then all the training is done before you go to an event, you’re got all your first aid training.
“You get supervised through a process of different training modules and that’ll be done over a six month period. At the end of that, you’ll be a first responder with a full first responder scope of practice.
“It’s a great community environment, it’s great to give something back to the local community and to get the skills that you get along the way, it’s just an added bonus. It’s life saving skills that you won’t get anywhere else.”
To register your interest, go to www.stjohnvic.com.au/volunteer-form/
