Current events

Hungarian Firemen Qualified As Ambulance Nurses

17 firemen of the Nuclear Power Plant Fire Service successfully passed their final exams and got certificates on 22 October 2008, as a termination of their two and a half year studies on ambulance attendance.
In the opinion of the teachers and well-known professionals who were members of the examination board, it was a totally uncommon experience for them. Why? And why was this training so important? The answer to these questions comes from the fact that NPP Fire Service provides emergency care with one motor ambulance throughout the Plant site and, in certain cases, outside the Plant. Fire Service management intended to ensure that a well-trained personnel is available for this task. When alerted, the ambulance is out on the scene with a personnel of 3, including an ambulance doctor, an ambulance attendant and a driver who can also help as a qualified ambulance nurse. Moreover, people injured in accidents or otherwise can have a higher-level health care provision when such qualifications are available for the personnel even if the motor ambulance is out of reach.

When the ambulance car is called out to provide emergency assistance in another case, or is not on the site for any other reason, the fire engine sent out to the scene can be equipped with means necessary for the basic health care provision (defibrillator, oxygen cylinder, emergency pouch, fracture fixation kit, etc.) and qualified ambulance nurses in service on the engine can provide aid to injured or sick victims at their respective competence levels. As regards the other reason why this training of our firemen is considered a real rarity and a very good example, words of the chair of the examination board Tibor Pápai, head of the Emergency Health Care Centre of the State Health Centre of the Ministry of Defence, are cited here: “I think this exam is a real rarity partly because it is not typical for firemen to qualify as ambulance attendants and, partly, because they took part in the training in a very high number, which is unparalleled”.

According to the President of the National Ambulance Association Attila Tóth, NPP Fire Service is a rarity all the more because first aid training courses have been conducted there since the very beginning, and the overwhelming majority of firemen has already qualified at medium level as certified first aid attendants with appropriate skills. In his experience, trainees performed well above the average level in this training session. In the opinion of Dr. Gábor Szvitán, head physician of the Hungarian National Ambulance and Emergency Service (OMSZ), NPP Fire Service maintains an exemplary training system for firemen. According to training manager Mrs. Éva Vasasné Juhász, it is praiseworthy for the Fire Service to organize a two and a half year training session that could run with so much inherent dynamism and swing. Ambulance officer and ambulance station head József Feil pointed out, as a commendable example to be followed, firemen’s active attitude to learning.

Our Fire Service has always paid great attention to providing opportunities for the continuing training and education of firemen, due to which each staff member has already passed a medium-level first aid exam, while 33 of them are qualified and 3 certified ambulance nurses. Now, as many as 20 fire fighters are allowed to serve aboard the ambulance as qualified attendants.
Congrats to our firemen for their good performance and successful exams!

by Mrs. Anna Lovásziné
Nuclear Power Plant - November 2008 issue