Surf Talk Episode 7 - First Aid & CPR
This week we welcome guest host Jessica McCall, who joins us to interview Surf Talk’s Ross Smith about his journey from being a paramedic to a Business and Growth Specialist at SLSSA, and the importance of First Aid & CPR.
Jessica McCall is a third-year journalism student at UniSA who hosts the television show ‘BTS with Jess’ on local community channels, including Channel 44 in Adelaide, Channel 31 in Melbourne, and Channel 83 in New Zealand.
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Ross Smith:
00:05-00:38
Hi. I'm Ross Smith and welcome to Surf Talk. Surf Life Saving South Australia's podcast. Every fortnight we're releasing new episodes of Surf Talk. We'll be talking everything Surf Life Saving South Australia. What we're about, what we do and on the way interviewing some amazing people from club members and their achievements to outstanding rescues and everything in between. Once again welcome to Surf Talk we're going to mix it up a bit this episode we've got a guest host coming on today and I'd like to introduce you to Jessica McCall. Jess is going to be our guest host for Surf Talk and actually interview me. So welcome Jess to Surf Talk.
Jess McCall:
00:38-00:45
Thank you, Ross. Thanks for having me on Surf Talk. I'm really excited to guest host today, and, yeah, I can't wait to see where the episode goes.
Ross Smith:
00:45-00:52
Well, it's really nice to have you, Jess. So people are probably wondering who the heck you are. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Jess McCall:
00:52-01:36
Gosh. Where do I start, Ross? Well, firstly, I should probably give a little bit of context. So Ross and I actually met at the Colonnades by the Sea Expo last year. So I was emceeing the expo. Ross was there with with his surf lifesaving stall, and that's how we got to know each other. And now I'm guest hosting the podcast. So I'm a journalism student at UniSA, and I have a television program on local community channels. So channel forty four Adelaide, channel thirty one Melbourne, and actually channel eighty three in New Zealand as well. And it's called BTS with Jess, stands for behind the scenes, and it's an arts show for young people. And so through that, I do a lot of community work, a lot of, like, volunteer work, getting out there in the community, that that type of thing.
Ross Smith:
01:36-01:39
So How far into your degree are you?
Jess McCall:
01:39-01:57
Right now, as we're recording this, I'm, like, almost finished. So almost at the end of my three years. I spaced it out a little bit more though because I've got a part time job now. So I'm doing, like, half work, half TV show, and then somehow cramming my studies in at the same time.
Ross Smith:
01:57-01:59
Half and half. I'm doing something else in the middle.
Jess McCall:
01:59-02:03
Exactly. Yes. So it's a little bit of a of a tight squeeze.
Ross Smith:
02:03-02:06
Well, look. It's lovely to have you, Jess. Look.
Jess McCall:
02:06-02:06
Thank you.
Ross Smith:
02:06-02:07
Take the show away. It's all yours.
Jess McCall:
02:08-02:38
Well, thank you so much, Ross. And, yeah, welcome to episode seven of Surf Talk, Surf Lifesaving South Australia's podcast. As you just heard, my name's Jessica McCall, and I'm your guest host today. So it's great to be hosting the episode. And I think, you know, having episodes like this from organizations like Surf Life Saving, I was just thinking about this this morning. It's really good to, like, get the word out there about what Surf Life Saving does. And having me on the show, I think, you know, I'm really appreciative that I can share this with my audience too
Ross Smith:
02:39-02:39
Sure.
Jess McCall:
02:39-02:52
Yeah. And get the message out there for Surf Yeah. Absolutely. So, Ross, can you tell our listeners a little bit about your background and what you do with Serf Lifesaving? Because as the host, maybe people don't know too much about what you do.
Ross Smith:
02:52-03:23
That's correct. I interview a lot of people, and we have, you know, a lot of the discussions about certain departments in Surf Life Saving. But my background's an interesting one. I started off as a ambulance paramedic. I did almost twenty years as a paramedic ranging everything from, helicopter through to I worked for the flying doctors for a couple of years to a bit of intensive care work to on the road to management, so a whole aspect of ambulance work. I left ambulance work in in the early two thousands and had no other skills right except for saving lives.
Jess McCall:
03:23-03:25
Yeah. Pretty good skill to have.
Ross Smith:
03:25-03:33
Yeah. Certainly not podcast skills. I wasn't a carpenter or a plumber or whatever so I naturally progressed into setting up my own first aid and medical training company.
Jess McCall:
03:33-03:34
Wow.
Ross Smith:
03:34-04:09
I I run that for for several years and then I sold that and now I'm consulting with originally consulting the surf lifesaving in the business and growth area. Now I'm employed by the guys and my role is to sort of look at the the the revenue as far as commercial side of surf lifesaving because we do a lot of first aid training and pool lifeguard training, boat license training, and my job is to try and get some I suppose if you look at it bums on seats. And the more revenue we get in, that all just gets pumped out to our volunteers and our, you know, our members out there.
Jess McCall:
04:09-04:17
So Yeah. And what made you transition from being a paramedic working with ambulances to being a business growth specialist here at Surf Life Saving?
Ross Smith:
04:17-04:42
Yeah. That's an interesting one. I'm still very passionate about medical, and I I mean, I'm heavily involved in still sort of that side of of things. I keep up to date. I know I was a member of the Australian resuscitation council for many many years, which is the governing body of first aid. But my wife encouraged me to get into businesses from a paramedic. I was a paramedic, and my last ever job, I got assaulted on the streets. So it gets pretty violent out there now as we've heard on the news.
Jess McCall:
04:42-04:42
That's crazy.
Ross Smith:
04:42-04:54
Yeah. It was crazy. And I was sort of sitting in my forties, and my wife was, you know, sort of an entrepreneur and done very well in business. And so why don't you start a business? And I went, oh, okay. Business, right? I don't know how to do that.
Ross Smith:
04:54-05:12
So setting up registered training organization, I didn't naturally grew into business, and we grew that from, you know, a small backyard business with two people to 30 odd staff in South Australia and consultants working for us all all over Australia, plus we had international work, and it grew significantly till I sold it in 2014. Right?
Ross Smith:
05:12-05:58
And and sold it to a large mining and, critical infrastructure organization in in Brisbane actually. And I spent about a year and a half flying back and forth to Brisbane every week in a board role like a in like an executive role transitioning the business they just bought into their new business. And so so I learned over that sort of fourteen odd years you know how to grow from zero to the hero as a business and and so that business skill come from medical's really my passion but the business skills just there I know how to grow and build a business so I come on board here and we need as much revenue as we can get in here right and we've got 9,000 members out there there's a lot of people a lot of equipment a lot of things to look after so that's where I transition sort of from my role here.
Ross Smith:
05:58-06:17
Look I do training and stuff as well but my main role is to get bumps on seats and I've even looked at minor sponsor opportunities for locals and people coming to talk about you know wanting to brand up one of our sports or do stuff like this so it's a really interesting role. I do lots of networking meetings and and the like to to get revenue in the door. That's my main role.
Jess McCall:
06:17-06:31
That's so interesting. And that's got me thinking, like, you know, being in the medical profession and saving lives is so different to being in business. Like, how do those two kind of mesh, and how long did it take you to get a a grip on that?
Ross Smith:
06:31-06:41
Yeah. It was interesting. I thought it'd be quite a difficult process, but I think business is about relationship building, and I think as a paramedic, you have to build relationships with your patient very quickly.
Jess McCall:
06:42-06:43
True yes.
Ross Smith:
06:43-07:53
And you don't know walking your door on someone sick and injured there's that whole process of communicating with them and building a strong bond and relationship so they have to trust you to do things sometimes that are uncomfortable painful and and they're you know they're at great risk right so I think that skill now in business it's about trust and about relationship building so I think that's where the transition fits that's where it comes from having really good bonding with people and communication skills to be able to do the same thing in business. And another advantage was knowing what some businesses may experience when needing first aid when I had my first aid company. Do the same thing now. I talk to people and say I'm from, you know, x y zed proprietor firm, but then we we were at warehouse. I said, well, gee, you might have a lot of back injuries, people slipping over on the dust, and I go, how did you know? Well, I've been there as a paramedic. I've seen those injuries because that was my role. Yes. And so I can sort of see where the the injuries and what they may have for their business so we can sort of tailor the first aid to suit. So, yeah, that's that's sort of how I think I got into putting that business cap on purely from that relationship. And I always say to everyone, business is about building relationships.
Jess McCall:
07:53-08:02
Exactly. And I think as well, you know, having those interpersonal skills and that relationship building ability is really applicable to self life saving as well.
Ross Smith:
08:02-08:02
Absolutely.
Jess McCall:
08:02-08:06
An organization and group of people that that helps to save lives, essentially.
Ross Smith:
08:06-08:16
And that's it. And I think our people out there that are doing patrols, there's a multiple of other, you know, organizations within this organization. There's sports, and there's community, and we've had discussions about it in our podcast.
Jess McCall:
08:16-08:17
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
08:17-08:51
But the people out there that look after people, rescuing people, you've got to build a very quick bond. So, you know, we at Surf Lifesaving, and we've talked about this in one of our podcast episodes about boat license courses, about first aid courses, about surf, lifeguard courses. We do all these sort of courses here, and our trainers have had real life experience. For example, our, you know, first aid trained a couple of them have, surf lifesavers, and they still are active first life surf lifesavers. So they build a good relationship. So our courses get great feedback because the people they're teaching it Yeah. Have done it in real life.
Jess McCall:
08:51-08:51
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
08:52-09:03
They can talk about it in real life. So, yeah, we have some amazing and I like to I'm a trainer and assessor as well. So I I occasionally get asked or often get asked to to do first aid training as well, and I'm happy to step in and do that.
Jess McCall:
09:04-09:06
So what does it involve being a trainer and assessor?
Ross Smith:
09:06-09:21
You've got to go through, I think it's called a TA or a TAA type of it's a it's a an an accredited course to become a trainer and assessor. I don't think it makes you a good trainer. What it does, it just makes you understand about the training industry.
Jess McCall:
09:21-09:21
Right.
Ross Smith:
09:21-09:52
Unless you've got good interpersonal skills and good I think training, I call it edutainment. Right? Where is so if you're educating with a bit of entertainment in there, and if someone's boring and stands up and just flicks through a PowerPoint, you're gonna fall asleep and and not learn it. So a good trainer will have that good communication skills just like our surf lifesaving people that are on the beach and everywhere else communicating with with people all the time, you know, being proactive about making sure the water's safe So they make good drainage. So, yeah, I think that was your question. I've probably gone off track, but I do that all the time, Jess.
Jess McCall:
09:52-10:01
I mean, that's that's a great answer as far as I'm concerned, and I totally agree with what you're saying. Like, if you've got someone boring and they're just standing there, you know, like a cardboard cutout, no one's gonna listen.
Ross Smith:
10:01-10:02
Yeah. No one's gonna listen.
Jess McCall:
10:02-10:09
And then we're not gonna get the message out about water safety and, know, don't swim here. Don't swim there. Watch out. There's a shark over there. Well, if no one's listening. You know?
Ross Smith:
10:09-10:45
Yeah. And they're good communicators. So that's why I would say we pride ourselves on our our commercial side here to bring a revenue in to support all our volunteers. The people doing even the boat license, you know, it's all about safety as well. Stu's a boat license educator. He is absolutely passionate about that. Our pool lifeguard trainer, we do all the pool lifeguard. A lot of pool lifeguards that are around you seeing pools here in Adelaide and all over South Australia are trained by us, and Andrew Henry is one of our trainers, and he he's passionate about it, but he's been a a pool lifeguard. He's also a surf lifesaver, so he knows, how to communicate and what to expect. So it's more realistic. So we're very lucky here. Yeah. We're very lucky. Yeah.
Ross Smith:
10:46-11:13
Well, Jess, you've had a few I've asked answered a few of your questions. Well, there's a few bit bit of questions scribbled down on some paper here. Right? So you've introduced yourself. You said about BTS with Jess. Normally, we have a bit of a break sort of midway through our podcast in ten or ten so minutes in and talk about our sponsor. But we're not doing that today. We haven't got a sponsor to talk about today. So can you tell listeners a bit about yourself again and your exciting venture with BTS with Jess? Just a little bit over that. How did that all sort of come about?
Jess McCall:
11:14-12:53
Sure. So I'll get into it a little bit. So as I mentioned before, I've well, I'm kind of in my last year slash almost finishing my studies at the University of South Australia, and they actually have a partnership with our local community TV channel here in Adelaide, which is channel forty four. It mainly broadcasts in Metropolitan Adelaide, but you can get it in some spots here and there outside of the city as well. And they, yeah, they have partnerships with, I think, yeah, Flinders Uni, uni UniSA, and we actually film a show at UniSA in the McGill campus called Our Time. And that's how I kind of found out about channel forty four to start with back when I first began my studies. I realized, wow. Like, there's a community TV channel here in Adelaide. They take student content. They take local content. People can make shows for channel forty four, it can be really you know, there's so many different genres of shows on there. You've got talk shows. You've got adventure kind of shows. You've got all fishing shows, a lot of sports shows. There's a whole range of different things. So they're really, you know, open minded to taking new content, which is awesome. So I was I I was thinking, well, you know, I'd love to grab the bull by the horns and have my own show. It's, you know, a goal of mine to to get into journalism and broadcast, and it's what I'm studying at uni. So I thought, well, get to work and pitch a show. And so I got in touch with them, you know, pitched my show. They they said, oh, you know, go away and fix this, you know, tweak that, do this, do that. So I did. And then they were really happy with it and took my show on board. And, well, the rest is history.
Ross Smith:
12:54-12:58
So people people still see the shows? Are they still available on on channel forty four?
Jess McCall:
12:59-13:10
Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. So it's on on Monday nights at 07:30, and then they schedule it throughout the week at other times too. But, yeah, 07:30 on Mondays at night is the main slot.
Ross Smith:
13:10-13:11
And what's the show mainly about?
Jess McCall:
13:11-13:32
So it's about youth arts. So it's a documentary style show hosted by myself. I interview young artists and arts organizations all around South Australia. There's four episodes in season one. There's a dance one, a theater one, a street art one, like covering murals and whatnot, and a music one. So four different topics for season one.
Ross Smith:
13:32-13:37
Maybe surf life saving? So maybe should do, you know, behind the scenes of surf life saving show.
Jess McCall:
13:37-13:38
That could be cool.
Ross Smith:
13:39-13:41
How the how our different departments operate.
Jess McCall:
13:41-13:43
I bet there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes too.
Ross Smith:
13:44-13:48
Huge amount that goes on behind the scenes just to get people ready for our season because
Jess McCall:
13:44-13:48
Totally.
Ross Smith:
13:48-13:52
Our season's October to sort of end of, you know, Easter. So in April
Jess McCall:
13:51-13:52
That's a long season.
Ross Smith:
13:52-14:01
It's a long season to have people out on the beach on long weekends and on public holidays and, you know, and turn up and they're doing incredible. I'm I'm just look. I'm passionate about working here.
Jess McCall:
14:01-14:02
That's great.
Ross Smith:
14:02-14:15
Because I love what their the organization stands for, and I love what they do. Their water safety campaigns there, you know, the the the way they keep people safer and the way they can rescue people and give advice, just incredible there. And they've so dedicated.
Jess McCall:
14:15-14:18
You gotta be passionate about it. Otherwise Yeah. What's the point?
Ross Smith:
14:18-14:21
You know? That's the point. And I don't go working somewhere or being somewhere if you're not passionate.
Jess McCall:
14:21-14:21
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
14:21-14:27
Okay. Thanks, Jess. That that's I'm sure listeners, look. Please go and have a look at, Jess' show because I I have, and it's really good.
Jess McCall:
14:27-14:28
Oh thank you.
Ross Smith:
14:28-14:33
I'm sure you're gonna go a long way in in, journalism, and have your own TV show. Right?
Jess McCall:
14:33-14:34
Oh, thank you.
Ross Smith:
14:34-14:34
That'd be great.
Jess McCall:
14:34-14:40
So you're passionate, Ross, about people learning first aid and CPR. Can you go into more detail about why this is such a big passion of yours?
Ross Smith:
14:44-15:00
Yeah. As I said before, I'm passionate about surf life saving. I love what they do, but one of my deep passions is people learning first aid, in particular CPR. As a paramedic, it was so frustrating to turn up to someone in cardiac arrest. That means they're not breathing and their heart stopped.
Jess McCall:
15:00-15:00
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
15:01-15:11
And no one was doing CPR. Now often in the workplace, people were doing CPR, but ninety about ninety four percent of cardiac arrest happened in and around the family home.
Jess McCall:
15:11-15:12
Right.
Ross Smith:
15:12-15:23
And we used to go there, and people were standing around, whether it's a small child that drowned, whether it's an older person that's just collapsed, and and and and they're standing around and and waiting for the ambulance to arrive.
Jess McCall:
15:23-15:25
Why does no one do anything and and jump in and help?
Ross Smith:
15:25-15:38
Look. It's it's intriguing. There was a survey done many years ago, and and it's still coming back that around ten percent of our population are prepared to resuscitate a stranger or even a family member.
Jess McCall:
15:38-15:38
Ten percent?
Ross Smith:
15:38-15:41
Yes. That's sort of ninety percent of people not prepared.
Jess McCall:
15:41-15:41
Wow.
Ross Smith:
15:41-15:58
And I think it's fear based. You know, first aid is workplace first aid is is great, but the thing about first aid, you don't think about it every day or CPR. You don't get up in the morning and go, oh, I better go buy some milk and bread, and I think I might buy myself some CPR training.
Jess McCall:
15:58-15:58
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
15:59-16:26
It's not top of mind. And when it does happen, it's terrifying. Right? So there's a few changes around the world, and we're starting to adopt it in Australia where they're simplifying CPR. Now there's workplace first aid which we do here, so if you in a workplace SafeWork Australia said you have to have so many first aiders and this is the quality you need to have which is absolutely what we do. We get people in here and they go back to the workplace and they're protected in case something goes wrong, they also could use it for their family.
Jess McCall:
16:26-16:26
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
16:26-17:15
But there's also a simplified first aid method where they're talking about it's called call push shock. So call an ambulance, push up and down on someone's chest if you believe that they need it, and it's pretty easy to pick up. Yeah. And then shock, and shock's using a defibrillator. I'll talk a bit more about defibrillators later. And we're seeing around the world with this method of a sort of community first aid rather than workplace first aid to and simplifying it has reduced the barriers. So we're seeing worldwide more the statistics going up in certain parts of the world that people are prepared to resuscitate someone because they've simplified it. And some of the fears around it, you know, I went to a course and, oh, it was four years ago, couldn't remember what to do. I don't wanna put my mouth on someone. So they've taken that away. They're just saying call for help. Get an ambulance on the way. The ambulance call taker will tell you what to do anyway.
Jess McCall:
17:15-17:16
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
17:16-17:20
Then they're saying now don't worry about the breathing thing. Just press like crazy
Jess McCall:
17:18-17:20
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
17:20-17:45
Until help arrives. And if you've got a defibrillator, close, use that immediately. Right? So that's what they're saying, and it's and it's making a difference. People in the community are starting worldwide. We're just introducing it here slowly. Ambulance services around Australia are looking at promoting that. There's a promotion last October in Rundle Mall about call push shock, and it's gonna get more and more popular to try and get people to, you know, understand it's the basics that save lives.
Jess McCall:
17:45-17:50
Yeah. So it's really the complexity or perceived complexity of saving a life which turns people off, and they kind of
Ross Smith:
17:50-17:56
I think so. But if someone's pouring blood out, just grab a tea towel or whatever and put it on hold up in the air. I've always, you know, run courses and said to someone, we're gonna teach you the bandaging. We have to teach you bandaging. But if someone is pouring blood out, jsut gram a tea towel on put it on it and call for help.
Jess McCall:
18:01-18:10
Exactly. And that's what I was taught. I remember my mum telling me this specifically when I was little when she taught me first aid. And she said, you know, grab a cloth, grab a towel, grab anything, and just put pressure on it.
Ross Smith:
18:10-18:12
Pressure. Lay the person down. Wait for help.
Jess McCall:
18:12-18:13
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
18:13-18:40
And when you're calling that ambulance, the ambulance call taker will step you through to assist you. So it's fantastic. Look. I'm I'm certainly encourage everyone to come to a first aid course because they're not as complicated as they used to be. They have simplified first aid for a reason, not to dumb it down so people can walk out the door and remember what to do. But when it starts coming to community, we really need to address this and get a particular use of a defibrillator. People don't know why we use a defibrillator in call push shock.
Jess McCall:
18:40-18:56
Having everything simplified for people is really helpful when emergencies do pop up. And people have gotta go, oh, like, what was I taught in that first aid class? And, you know, things like CPR, call push, and shock, it sounds like that's really helpful for that. But can you explain more about it?
Ross Smith:
18:56-19:55
Yeah. I think look. Look. As I said, it's a simple process, calling for help, pressing up and down the chest like crazy, just visualize the center of the chest, and then use a defibrillator. Often people don't know what the importance of a defibrillator is. One thing I'd like listeners to do if they aren't doing it is find out where your local defibrillator is. Now they're sitting in front of pharmacies now. They're in at pubs. They're in community centers, libraries. We're starting to see them at, you know, the airport. Know where your closest defibrillator is. Some people in your street might have a defibrillator. Ask around. Get the street. Some parts of the world, have committed defibrillators in streets so you can access them like a fire extinguisher up, and the reason is so important is your heart goes into a life threatening rhythm. It's called ventricular fibrillation, and when you start CPR over the top of that you won't know that's happening. Your heart is like wobbling underneath your chest. So when you're doing CPR, you're becoming the person's heart, you're pumping for them by pressing down and releasing, pressing down like like CPR, you've seen CPR.
Jess McCall:
19:55-19:55
Yes.
Ross Smith:
19:55-20:05
That's becoming a pump. Now when the heart goes into this thing called ventricular fibrillation, it's a life threatening rhythm. The heart wobbles under your chest. You can't see it or feel it, so it doesn't fill up properly.
Jess McCall:
20:05-20:07
So why does it do that?
Ross Smith:
20:07-20:09
If we knew why, we could solve the problem.
Jess McCall:
20:09-20:10
We don't know.
Ross Smith:
20:10-20:42
Yeah. Even the best cardiologists in the world don't know why it has this massive electrical activity that starts. We know what the electrical activity is, and it's very technical and good to go into. We know what's firing off, but we don't know why. So a defibrillator and and because we're pressing up and down the chest, right, just quickly. We're pressing up and down on the chest and the problem is the heart's not filling properly full of blood so what our CPR is all about is getting oxygenated blood to the brain. We're just brain resuscitating that's all we're worrying about is, you know, we're keep the brain alive until emergency help arrives.
Jess McCall:
20:42-20:42
Yep.
Ross Smith:
20:42-20:53
So with this fibrillation taking place, when we're trying to push up and down the chest, we're not getting the same flow of blood we really want. Yes. It's enough to keep you just ticking over, just enough cells alive.
Jess McCall:
20:53-20:54
But it's not great.
Ross Smith:
20:54-21:03
It's not great. But as soon as we defibrillate, we stop that electrical activity. It it actually people think defibrillator is a heart status because in the movies, they go boom and they stand up
Jess McCall:
21:03-21:05
and And that's not great, really.
Ross Smith:
21:05-21:06
No. It's not heart status.
Jess McCall:
21:06-21:06
It puts people off.
Ross Smith:
21:07-21:08
They're heart stoppers.
Jess McCall:
21:08-21:09
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
21:09-21:19
So it stops the heart, puts it into what they call a systole or Americans call a flat line, in the flat buzzy line. Once the heart's in standstill, our CPR becomes hugely much more effective.
Jess McCall:
21:19-21:19
Right.
Ross Smith:
21:19-21:33
That's why it's such an important tool to have defibrillators. So if someone is is potentially at risk having, you know, heart problems or or someone's traveling in remote areas, I'd encourage them to look at getting a defibrillator.
Jess McCall:
21:33-21:35
How much are they? Like, where can you get them?
Ross Smith:
21:35-22:24
They range from sort of a thousand dollars, 1500 dollars to $5-6,000 depending on they all do the same thing. There's a personal one out there as well now. I think it's called the Cell AED. I think that's six or seven hundred dollars like that. It sounds like a lot of money but it'll save your life right? You break it over stick it on your chest and it does everything for you and defibrillates you, and it's kind of the missing link in CPR we really need to have a defibrillator. So as we're starting to see more public access defibrillators out there we're seeing more lives saved around the world. You know, some parts of the world have massive amount of defibrillators, they're everywhere, and we're getting there slowly but surely here, but I just want people to be aware that you know that's all it does. Anyone can use it. You don't have be trained to use a defibrillator. They talk to you. You press the on button like any good household appliance Yeah. And it tells you what to do. Wish half my stuff at home would tell me what to do.
Jess McCall:
22:24-22:29
Exactly. And do you know how many there are in in South Australia?
Ross Smith:
22:29-22:44
I don't know, but there is registration now. A lot of there is a registration. I think it was a thing called Good Sam. There's a couple of other ones. I think a couple other organizations are setting up to have a monitor. I know that Greg, the yellow wiggle Yeah. He's got a, an app because he had a cardiac arrest.
Jess McCall:
22:44-22:45
Did he?
Ross Smith:
22:45-22:47
He off stage.
Ross Smith:
22:47-22:50
He and the only thing that saved his life was CPR and defibrillation.
Jess McCall:
22:50-22:50
Wow.
Ross Smith:
22:50-22:56
He was lucky there was a nurse there to do and and to assist, and he was lucky there was a defibrillator there.
Jess McCall:
22:56-22:56
Gosh.
Ross Smith:
22:56-23:02
So, yeah, I think heart of the nation, I think he's called. I'll I'll, you know, I'll check that, but and he's he's he's got an app. Right?
Jess McCall:
23:02-23:03
Yeah. Wow.
Ross Smith:
23:03-23:08
That actually will tell you where to, what to do and tell you where the where the fibrillators are located.
Jess McCall:
23:08-23:09
That's amazing.
Ross Smith:
23:09-23:18
Yeah. Yeah. So he's is passionate about I've spoken to Greg. He's passionate about people learning community CPR and learning how to use a defibrillator. Yeah.
Jess McCall:
23:18-23:36
Yeah. Gosh. Goodness me. So we've talked a lot about first aid and how important it is and how it can help the community. But for those listening, how can they actually learn first aid for themselves and then go out there and apply it in an easy way that's applicable to what whatever they do in the community?
Ross Smith:
23:36-25:33
Yeah. Sure. Look. We run regular first aid courses, which includes all first aid includes CPR so if you book into a first aid course it does have CPR with it you can book in just just a plain CPR courses go to our Surf Life Saving website website surflifesavingsa.com forward slash courses and we schedule regular courses. So they're all so workplace approved courses, but I also we're starting to run courses now community based and if there's parents out there, a parents group, your new mums group, if there's a childcare center or after school care, an OSH, and we've done one recently where we went in with the kids who are six to 11 Mhmm. Teaching them using a pillow how to do CPR, and they all went like, oh, this is really they all loved it. Right? But they got some knowledge out of it. So if anyone out there listening that wanted wants to that just give us a buzz on 83546900 and ask for me because I'm happy to do that or any community group like we've had, some neighborhood watch groups and you know some people getting into seniors wanting that they want to don't want to come in and do a workplace first aid but we know we charge a small fee and we'll go out and show them how to do CPR in case their loved one collapses right. So yeah first of all most importantly get to our website surflifesavingsa.com. Aucourses have a look what we've got if you can't see what you want give us a call and also they've simplified CPR and first aid you can actually do some online training now so all the theory you normally sit through hours and hours of it's online it's pretty easy to do, a multi choice question with videos once you've done that you can come into one of our classes I think CPR is an hour and a half now instead of a four or five hours and our first aid our we call provide first aid, which is your nationally accredited first aid, that's literally about four hours. So it's more practical based. So you come in and do the practical stuff rather than sit through the theory. So, yeah, it's really good. So encourage anyone to do that.
Jess McCall:
25:34-25:44
And what are some examples that you can think of off the top of your head of people who have learnt first aid from you guys at Surf Life Saving and then gone out and applied it and saved someone's life?
Ross Smith:
25:44-26:52
Yeah. Look. We don't get a lot of people ring back and say that they've done this because often people, you know, in shock or have had had nasty experience, but I've had several people in my lifetime say because you taught it so clearly I just listened to you say in my head stay calm, do what you can do, hold the pressure on the wound, and I've had several people call me back or write testimonials about that. We get testimonials here all the time and say how practical the course was. Think it's hard for us to gauge how many first aid incidents there are out there but the feedback we get is it's practical simple and practical and and that's what I love about like I said here the training is that it's not it's not comp too complex it's not theory based it doesn't need to be the more we slow it down and simplify it the better. Yeah and I've like stuff had a couple of great testimonials come back for people to say wow if it wasn't for you telling me this they would have choked to death or something would happen and it's great it's great feedback to have that you know it's it's it's a skill that everyone in Australia should have from small children right up to 90 or a hundred. I don't care how old they old you are. And particularly CPR, it's not hard. Alright?
Jess McCall:
26:53-27:13
Ross, it has been so great to be on the podcast today. Thanks for having me, and it's been awesome to hear your knowledge about first aid and CPR and just how important it is for everyone in the community to get behind it and to get behind Surf Life Saving SA as well. What is the best way for listeners to get in touch with you guys and book one of your courses?
Ross Smith:
27:13-27:26
Sure. I'm gonna get one more time because we're just gonna get people to go across this. SurfLifeSavingSA.com.au/courses, and they can book into a course there online themselves, or give us a buzz on 83546900.
Jess McCall:
27:27-27:34
Exactly. Well, that's it. Get behind it and learn first aid for yourself. It's a lot simpler than what it sounds.
Ross Smith:
27:34-27:35
It certainly is.
Jess McCall:
27:35-27:55
Well, thank you everyone for listening to this episode. It has been my pleasure to be your guest host today for Surf Talk and chat to Ross. If you enjoyed the podcast, please subscribe to get all our episodes for free, and feel free to share our podcast link to anyone you know because we wanna get share the word with as many people as possible.
Ross Smith:
27:55-28:11
We do Jess absolutely and look we're getting some good listeners here but we certainly would love you to share it if you like it share it. People, yeah our members are listening, some of our people on our social media are listening, we want people to share it that don't know about Surf Life Saving as well. It's so important.
Jess McCall:
28:11-28:12
Exactly. Gotta get the word out there.
Ross Smith:
28:12-28:24
So thank you, Jess. It's been a pleasure to have you here hosting. It's a change to be interviewed rather than me interview someone else. I hope you go well with all your endeavors with your BTS and every other journalist endeavors you're having in the future.
Jess McCall:
28:24-28:24
Thank you.
Ross Smith:
28:24-28:29
And it's nice to hear another voice doing the hosting. So thanks, Jess. I appreciate it.
Jess McCall:
28:29-28:30
I'm Jessica McCall.
Ross Smith:
28:30-28:31
And I'm Ross Smith.
Jess McCall:
28:31-28:36
And you have been listening to Surf Talk. Get inspired and get involved.
Ross Smith:
28:36-28:37
Thank you for listening.Ross Smith:
00:05-00:38
Hi. I'm Ross Smith and welcome to Surf Talk. Surf Life Saving South Australia's podcast. Every fortnight we're releasing new episodes of Surf Talk. We'll be talking everything Surf Life Saving South Australia. What we're about, what we do and on the way interviewing some amazing people from club members and their achievements to outstanding rescues and everything in between. Once again welcome to Surf Talk we're going to mix it up a bit this episode we've got a guest host coming on today and I'd like to introduce you to Jessica McCall. Jess is going to be our guest host for Surf Talk and actually interview me. So welcome Jess to Surf Talk.
Jess McCall:
00:38-00:45
Thank you, Ross. Thanks for having me on Surf Talk. I'm really excited to guest host today, and, yeah, I can't wait to see where the episode goes.
Ross Smith:
00:45-00:52
Well, it's really nice to have you, Jess. So people are probably wondering who the heck you are. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Jess McCall:
00:52-01:36
Gosh. Where do I start, Ross? Well, firstly, I should probably give a little bit of context. So Ross and I actually met at the Colonnades by the Sea Expo last year. So I was emceeing the expo. Ross was there with with his surf lifesaving stall, and that's how we got to know each other. And now I'm guest hosting the podcast. So I'm a journalism student at UniSA, and I have a television program on local community channels. So channel forty four Adelaide, channel thirty one Melbourne, and actually channel eighty three in New Zealand as well. And it's called BTS with Jess, stands for behind the scenes, and it's an arts show for young people. And so through that, I do a lot of community work, a lot of, like, volunteer work, getting out there in the community, that that type of thing.
Ross Smith:
01:36-01:39
So How far into your degree are you?
Jess McCall:
01:39-01:57
Right now, as we're recording this, I'm, like, almost finished. So almost at the end of my three years. I spaced it out a little bit more though because I've got a part time job now. So I'm doing, like, half work, half TV show, and then somehow cramming my studies in at the same time.
Ross Smith:
01:57-01:59
Half and half. I'm doing something else in the middle.
Jess McCall:
01:59-02:03
Exactly. Yes. So it's a little bit of a of a tight squeeze.
Ross Smith:
02:03-02:06
Well, look. It's lovely to have you, Jess. Look.
Jess McCall:
02:06-02:06
Thank you.
Ross Smith:
02:06-02:07
Take the show away. It's all yours.
Jess McCall:
02:08-02:38
Well, thank you so much, Ross. And, yeah, welcome to episode seven of Surf Talk, Surf Lifesaving South Australia's podcast. As you just heard, my name's Jessica McCall, and I'm your guest host today. So it's great to be hosting the episode. And I think, you know, having episodes like this from organizations like Surf Life Saving, I was just thinking about this this morning. It's really good to, like, get the word out there about what Surf Life Saving does. And having me on the show, I think, you know, I'm really appreciative that I can share this with my audience too
Ross Smith:
02:39-02:39
Sure.
Jess McCall:
02:39-02:52
Yeah. And get the message out there for Surf Yeah. Absolutely. So, Ross, can you tell our listeners a little bit about your background and what you do with Serf Lifesaving? Because as the host, maybe people don't know too much about what you do.
Ross Smith:
02:52-03:23
That's correct. I interview a lot of people, and we have, you know, a lot of the discussions about certain departments in Surf Life Saving. But my background's an interesting one. I started off as a ambulance paramedic. I did almost twenty years as a paramedic ranging everything from, helicopter through to I worked for the flying doctors for a couple of years to a bit of intensive care work to on the road to management, so a whole aspect of ambulance work. I left ambulance work in in the early two thousands and had no other skills right except for saving lives.
Jess McCall:
03:23-03:25
Yeah. Pretty good skill to have.
Ross Smith:
03:25-03:33
Yeah. Certainly not podcast skills. I wasn't a carpenter or a plumber or whatever so I naturally progressed into setting up my own first aid and medical training company.
Jess McCall:
03:33-03:34
Wow.
Ross Smith:
03:34-04:09
I I run that for for several years and then I sold that and now I'm consulting with originally consulting the surf lifesaving in the business and growth area. Now I'm employed by the guys and my role is to sort of look at the the the revenue as far as commercial side of surf lifesaving because we do a lot of first aid training and pool lifeguard training, boat license training, and my job is to try and get some I suppose if you look at it bums on seats. And the more revenue we get in, that all just gets pumped out to our volunteers and our, you know, our members out there.
Jess McCall:
04:09-04:17
So Yeah. And what made you transition from being a paramedic working with ambulances to being a business growth specialist here at Surf Life Saving?
Ross Smith:
04:17-04:42
Yeah. That's an interesting one. I'm still very passionate about medical, and I I mean, I'm heavily involved in still sort of that side of of things. I keep up to date. I know I was a member of the Australian resuscitation council for many many years, which is the governing body of first aid. But my wife encouraged me to get into businesses from a paramedic. I was a paramedic, and my last ever job, I got assaulted on the streets. So it gets pretty violent out there now as we've heard on the news.
Jess McCall:
04:42-04:42
That's crazy.
Ross Smith:
04:42-04:54
Yeah. It was crazy. And I was sort of sitting in my forties, and my wife was, you know, sort of an entrepreneur and done very well in business. And so why don't you start a business? And I went, oh, okay. Business, right? I don't know how to do that.
Ross Smith:
04:54-05:12
So setting up registered training organization, I didn't naturally grew into business, and we grew that from, you know, a small backyard business with two people to 30 odd staff in South Australia and consultants working for us all all over Australia, plus we had international work, and it grew significantly till I sold it in 2014. Right?
Ross Smith:
05:12-05:58
And and sold it to a large mining and, critical infrastructure organization in in Brisbane actually. And I spent about a year and a half flying back and forth to Brisbane every week in a board role like a in like an executive role transitioning the business they just bought into their new business. And so so I learned over that sort of fourteen odd years you know how to grow from zero to the hero as a business and and so that business skill come from medical's really my passion but the business skills just there I know how to grow and build a business so I come on board here and we need as much revenue as we can get in here right and we've got 9,000 members out there there's a lot of people a lot of equipment a lot of things to look after so that's where I transition sort of from my role here.
Ross Smith:
05:58-06:17
Look I do training and stuff as well but my main role is to get bumps on seats and I've even looked at minor sponsor opportunities for locals and people coming to talk about you know wanting to brand up one of our sports or do stuff like this so it's a really interesting role. I do lots of networking meetings and and the like to to get revenue in the door. That's my main role.
Jess McCall:
06:17-06:31
That's so interesting. And that's got me thinking, like, you know, being in the medical profession and saving lives is so different to being in business. Like, how do those two kind of mesh, and how long did it take you to get a a grip on that?
Ross Smith:
06:31-06:41
Yeah. It was interesting. I thought it'd be quite a difficult process, but I think business is about relationship building, and I think as a paramedic, you have to build relationships with your patient very quickly.
Jess McCall:
06:42-06:43
True yes.
Ross Smith:
06:43-07:53
And you don't know walking your door on someone sick and injured there's that whole process of communicating with them and building a strong bond and relationship so they have to trust you to do things sometimes that are uncomfortable painful and and they're you know they're at great risk right so I think that skill now in business it's about trust and about relationship building so I think that's where the transition fits that's where it comes from having really good bonding with people and communication skills to be able to do the same thing in business. And another advantage was knowing what some businesses may experience when needing first aid when I had my first aid company. Do the same thing now. I talk to people and say I'm from, you know, x y zed proprietor firm, but then we we were at warehouse. I said, well, gee, you might have a lot of back injuries, people slipping over on the dust, and I go, how did you know? Well, I've been there as a paramedic. I've seen those injuries because that was my role. Yes. And so I can sort of see where the the injuries and what they may have for their business so we can sort of tailor the first aid to suit. So, yeah, that's that's sort of how I think I got into putting that business cap on purely from that relationship. And I always say to everyone, business is about building relationships.
Jess McCall:
07:53-08:02
Exactly. And I think as well, you know, having those interpersonal skills and that relationship building ability is really applicable to self life saving as well.
Ross Smith:
08:02-08:02
Absolutely.
Jess McCall:
08:02-08:06
An organization and group of people that that helps to save lives, essentially.
Ross Smith:
08:06-08:16
And that's it. And I think our people out there that are doing patrols, there's a multiple of other, you know, organizations within this organization. There's sports, and there's community, and we've had discussions about it in our podcast.
Jess McCall:
08:16-08:17
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
08:17-08:51
But the people out there that look after people, rescuing people, you've got to build a very quick bond. So, you know, we at Surf Lifesaving, and we've talked about this in one of our podcast episodes about boat license courses, about first aid courses, about surf, lifeguard courses. We do all these sort of courses here, and our trainers have had real life experience. For example, our, you know, first aid trained a couple of them have, surf lifesavers, and they still are active first life surf lifesavers. So they build a good relationship. So our courses get great feedback because the people they're teaching it Yeah. Have done it in real life.
Jess McCall:
08:51-08:51
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
08:52-09:03
They can talk about it in real life. So, yeah, we have some amazing and I like to I'm a trainer and assessor as well. So I I occasionally get asked or often get asked to to do first aid training as well, and I'm happy to step in and do that.
Jess McCall:
09:04-09:06
So what does it involve being a trainer and assessor?
Ross Smith:
09:06-09:21
You've got to go through, I think it's called a TA or a TAA type of it's a it's a an an accredited course to become a trainer and assessor. I don't think it makes you a good trainer. What it does, it just makes you understand about the training industry.
Jess McCall:
09:21-09:21
Right.
Ross Smith:
09:21-09:52
Unless you've got good interpersonal skills and good I think training, I call it edutainment. Right? Where is so if you're educating with a bit of entertainment in there, and if someone's boring and stands up and just flicks through a PowerPoint, you're gonna fall asleep and and not learn it. So a good trainer will have that good communication skills just like our surf lifesaving people that are on the beach and everywhere else communicating with with people all the time, you know, being proactive about making sure the water's safe So they make good drainage. So, yeah, I think that was your question. I've probably gone off track, but I do that all the time, Jess.
Jess McCall:
09:52-10:01
I mean, that's that's a great answer as far as I'm concerned, and I totally agree with what you're saying. Like, if you've got someone boring and they're just standing there, you know, like a cardboard cutout, no one's gonna listen.
Ross Smith:
10:01-10:02
Yeah. No one's gonna listen.
Jess McCall:
10:02-10:09
And then we're not gonna get the message out about water safety and, know, don't swim here. Don't swim there. Watch out. There's a shark over there. Well, if no one's listening. You know?
Ross Smith:
10:09-10:45
Yeah. And they're good communicators. So that's why I would say we pride ourselves on our our commercial side here to bring a revenue in to support all our volunteers. The people doing even the boat license, you know, it's all about safety as well. Stu's a boat license educator. He is absolutely passionate about that. Our pool lifeguard trainer, we do all the pool lifeguard. A lot of pool lifeguards that are around you seeing pools here in Adelaide and all over South Australia are trained by us, and Andrew Henry is one of our trainers, and he he's passionate about it, but he's been a a pool lifeguard. He's also a surf lifesaver, so he knows, how to communicate and what to expect. So it's more realistic. So we're very lucky here. Yeah. We're very lucky. Yeah.
Ross Smith:
10:46-11:13
Well, Jess, you've had a few I've asked answered a few of your questions. Well, there's a few bit bit of questions scribbled down on some paper here. Right? So you've introduced yourself. You said about BTS with Jess. Normally, we have a bit of a break sort of midway through our podcast in ten or ten so minutes in and talk about our sponsor. But we're not doing that today. We haven't got a sponsor to talk about today. So can you tell listeners a bit about yourself again and your exciting venture with BTS with Jess? Just a little bit over that. How did that all sort of come about?
Jess McCall:
11:14-12:53
Sure. So I'll get into it a little bit. So as I mentioned before, I've well, I'm kind of in my last year slash almost finishing my studies at the University of South Australia, and they actually have a partnership with our local community TV channel here in Adelaide, which is channel forty four. It mainly broadcasts in Metropolitan Adelaide, but you can get it in some spots here and there outside of the city as well. And they, yeah, they have partnerships with, I think, yeah, Flinders Uni, uni UniSA, and we actually film a show at UniSA in the McGill campus called Our Time. And that's how I kind of found out about channel forty four to start with back when I first began my studies. I realized, wow. Like, there's a community TV channel here in Adelaide. They take student content. They take local content. People can make shows for channel forty four, it can be really you know, there's so many different genres of shows on there. You've got talk shows. You've got adventure kind of shows. You've got all fishing shows, a lot of sports shows. There's a whole range of different things. So they're really, you know, open minded to taking new content, which is awesome. So I was I I was thinking, well, you know, I'd love to grab the bull by the horns and have my own show. It's, you know, a goal of mine to to get into journalism and broadcast, and it's what I'm studying at uni. So I thought, well, get to work and pitch a show. And so I got in touch with them, you know, pitched my show. They they said, oh, you know, go away and fix this, you know, tweak that, do this, do that. So I did. And then they were really happy with it and took my show on board. And, well, the rest is history.
Ross Smith:
12:54-12:58
So people people still see the shows? Are they still available on on channel forty four?
Jess McCall:
12:59-13:10
Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. So it's on on Monday nights at 07:30, and then they schedule it throughout the week at other times too. But, yeah, 07:30 on Mondays at night is the main slot.
Ross Smith:
13:10-13:11
And what's the show mainly about?
Jess McCall:
13:11-13:32
So it's about youth arts. So it's a documentary style show hosted by myself. I interview young artists and arts organizations all around South Australia. There's four episodes in season one. There's a dance one, a theater one, a street art one, like covering murals and whatnot, and a music one. So four different topics for season one.
Ross Smith:
13:32-13:37
Maybe surf life saving? So maybe should do, you know, behind the scenes of surf life saving show.
Jess McCall:
13:37-13:38
That could be cool.
Ross Smith:
13:39-13:41
How the how our different departments operate.
Jess McCall:
13:41-13:43
I bet there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes too.
Ross Smith:
13:44-13:48
Huge amount that goes on behind the scenes just to get people ready for our season because
Jess McCall:
13:44-13:48
Totally.
Ross Smith:
13:48-13:52
Our season's October to sort of end of, you know, Easter. So in April
Jess McCall:
13:51-13:52
That's a long season.
Ross Smith:
13:52-14:01
It's a long season to have people out on the beach on long weekends and on public holidays and, you know, and turn up and they're doing incredible. I'm I'm just look. I'm passionate about working here.
Jess McCall:
14:01-14:02
That's great.
Ross Smith:
14:02-14:15
Because I love what their the organization stands for, and I love what they do. Their water safety campaigns there, you know, the the the way they keep people safer and the way they can rescue people and give advice, just incredible there. And they've so dedicated.
Jess McCall:
14:15-14:18
You gotta be passionate about it. Otherwise Yeah. What's the point?
Ross Smith:
14:18-14:21
You know? That's the point. And I don't go working somewhere or being somewhere if you're not passionate.
Jess McCall:
14:21-14:21
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
14:21-14:27
Okay. Thanks, Jess. That that's I'm sure listeners, look. Please go and have a look at, Jess' show because I I have, and it's really good.
Jess McCall:
14:27-14:28
Oh thank you.
Ross Smith:
14:28-14:33
I'm sure you're gonna go a long way in in, journalism, and have your own TV show. Right?
Jess McCall:
14:33-14:34
Oh, thank you.
Ross Smith:
14:34-14:34
That'd be great.
Jess McCall:
14:34-14:40
So you're passionate, Ross, about people learning first aid and CPR. Can you go into more detail about why this is such a big passion of yours?
Ross Smith:
14:44-15:00
Yeah. As I said before, I'm passionate about surf life saving. I love what they do, but one of my deep passions is people learning first aid, in particular CPR. As a paramedic, it was so frustrating to turn up to someone in cardiac arrest. That means they're not breathing and their heart stopped.
Jess McCall:
15:00-15:00
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
15:01-15:11
And no one was doing CPR. Now often in the workplace, people were doing CPR, but ninety about ninety four percent of cardiac arrest happened in and around the family home.
Jess McCall:
15:11-15:12
Right.
Ross Smith:
15:12-15:23
And we used to go there, and people were standing around, whether it's a small child that drowned, whether it's an older person that's just collapsed, and and and and they're standing around and and waiting for the ambulance to arrive.
Jess McCall:
15:23-15:25
Why does no one do anything and and jump in and help?
Ross Smith:
15:25-15:38
Look. It's it's intriguing. There was a survey done many years ago, and and it's still coming back that around ten percent of our population are prepared to resuscitate a stranger or even a family member.
Jess McCall:
15:38-15:38
Ten percent?
Ross Smith:
15:38-15:41
Yes. That's sort of ninety percent of people not prepared.
Jess McCall:
15:41-15:41
Wow.
Ross Smith:
15:41-15:58
And I think it's fear based. You know, first aid is workplace first aid is is great, but the thing about first aid, you don't think about it every day or CPR. You don't get up in the morning and go, oh, I better go buy some milk and bread, and I think I might buy myself some CPR training.
Jess McCall:
15:58-15:58
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
15:59-16:26
It's not top of mind. And when it does happen, it's terrifying. Right? So there's a few changes around the world, and we're starting to adopt it in Australia where they're simplifying CPR. Now there's workplace first aid which we do here, so if you in a workplace SafeWork Australia said you have to have so many first aiders and this is the quality you need to have which is absolutely what we do. We get people in here and they go back to the workplace and they're protected in case something goes wrong, they also could use it for their family.
Jess McCall:
16:26-16:26
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
16:26-17:15
But there's also a simplified first aid method where they're talking about it's called call push shock. So call an ambulance, push up and down on someone's chest if you believe that they need it, and it's pretty easy to pick up. Yeah. And then shock, and shock's using a defibrillator. I'll talk a bit more about defibrillators later. And we're seeing around the world with this method of a sort of community first aid rather than workplace first aid to and simplifying it has reduced the barriers. So we're seeing worldwide more the statistics going up in certain parts of the world that people are prepared to resuscitate someone because they've simplified it. And some of the fears around it, you know, I went to a course and, oh, it was four years ago, couldn't remember what to do. I don't wanna put my mouth on someone. So they've taken that away. They're just saying call for help. Get an ambulance on the way. The ambulance call taker will tell you what to do anyway.
Jess McCall:
17:15-17:16
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
17:16-17:20
Then they're saying now don't worry about the breathing thing. Just press like crazy
Jess McCall:
17:18-17:20
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
17:20-17:45
Until help arrives. And if you've got a defibrillator, close, use that immediately. Right? So that's what they're saying, and it's and it's making a difference. People in the community are starting worldwide. We're just introducing it here slowly. Ambulance services around Australia are looking at promoting that. There's a promotion last October in Rundle Mall about call push shock, and it's gonna get more and more popular to try and get people to, you know, understand it's the basics that save lives.
Jess McCall:
17:45-17:50
Yeah. So it's really the complexity or perceived complexity of saving a life which turns people off, and they kind of
Ross Smith:
17:50-17:56
I think so. But if someone's pouring blood out, just grab a tea towel or whatever and put it on hold up in the air. I've always, you know, run courses and said to someone, we're gonna teach you the bandaging. We have to teach you bandaging. But if someone is pouring blood out, jsut gram a tea towel on put it on it and call for help.
Jess McCall:
18:01-18:10
Exactly. And that's what I was taught. I remember my mum telling me this specifically when I was little when she taught me first aid. And she said, you know, grab a cloth, grab a towel, grab anything, and just put pressure on it.
Ross Smith:
18:10-18:12
Pressure. Lay the person down. Wait for help.
Jess McCall:
18:12-18:13
Exactly.
Ross Smith:
18:13-18:40
And when you're calling that ambulance, the ambulance call taker will step you through to assist you. So it's fantastic. Look. I'm I'm certainly encourage everyone to come to a first aid course because they're not as complicated as they used to be. They have simplified first aid for a reason, not to dumb it down so people can walk out the door and remember what to do. But when it starts coming to community, we really need to address this and get a particular use of a defibrillator. People don't know why we use a defibrillator in call push shock.
Jess McCall:
18:40-18:56
Having everything simplified for people is really helpful when emergencies do pop up. And people have gotta go, oh, like, what was I taught in that first aid class? And, you know, things like CPR, call push, and shock, it sounds like that's really helpful for that. But can you explain more about it?
Ross Smith:
18:56-19:55
Yeah. I think look. Look. As I said, it's a simple process, calling for help, pressing up and down the chest like crazy, just visualize the center of the chest, and then use a defibrillator. Often people don't know what the importance of a defibrillator is. One thing I'd like listeners to do if they aren't doing it is find out where your local defibrillator is. Now they're sitting in front of pharmacies now. They're in at pubs. They're in community centers, libraries. We're starting to see them at, you know, the airport. Know where your closest defibrillator is. Some people in your street might have a defibrillator. Ask around. Get the street. Some parts of the world, have committed defibrillators in streets so you can access them like a fire extinguisher up, and the reason is so important is your heart goes into a life threatening rhythm. It's called ventricular fibrillation, and when you start CPR over the top of that you won't know that's happening. Your heart is like wobbling underneath your chest. So when you're doing CPR, you're becoming the person's heart, you're pumping for them by pressing down and releasing, pressing down like like CPR, you've seen CPR.
Jess McCall:
19:55-19:55
Yes.
Ross Smith:
19:55-20:05
That's becoming a pump. Now when the heart goes into this thing called ventricular fibrillation, it's a life threatening rhythm. The heart wobbles under your chest. You can't see it or feel it, so it doesn't fill up properly.
Jess McCall:
20:05-20:07
So why does it do that?
Ross Smith:
20:07-20:09
If we knew why, we could solve the problem.
Jess McCall:
20:09-20:10
We don't know.
Ross Smith:
20:10-20:42
Yeah. Even the best cardiologists in the world don't know why it has this massive electrical activity that starts. We know what the electrical activity is, and it's very technical and good to go into. We know what's firing off, but we don't know why. So a defibrillator and and because we're pressing up and down the chest, right, just quickly. We're pressing up and down on the chest and the problem is the heart's not filling properly full of blood so what our CPR is all about is getting oxygenated blood to the brain. We're just brain resuscitating that's all we're worrying about is, you know, we're keep the brain alive until emergency help arrives.
Jess McCall:
20:42-20:42
Yep.
Ross Smith:
20:42-20:53
So with this fibrillation taking place, when we're trying to push up and down the chest, we're not getting the same flow of blood we really want. Yes. It's enough to keep you just ticking over, just enough cells alive.
Jess McCall:
20:53-20:54
But it's not great.
Ross Smith:
20:54-21:03
It's not great. But as soon as we defibrillate, we stop that electrical activity. It it actually people think defibrillator is a heart status because in the movies, they go boom and they stand up
Jess McCall:
21:03-21:05
and And that's not great, really.
Ross Smith:
21:05-21:06
No. It's not heart status.
Jess McCall:
21:06-21:06
It puts people off.
Ross Smith:
21:07-21:08
They're heart stoppers.
Jess McCall:
21:08-21:09
Yeah.
Ross Smith:
21:09-21:19
So it stops the heart, puts it into what they call a systole or Americans call a flat line, in the flat buzzy line. Once the heart's in standstill, our CPR becomes hugely much more effective.
Jess McCall:
21:19-21:19
Right.
Ross Smith:
21:19-21:33
That's why it's such an important tool to have defibrillators. So if someone is is potentially at risk having, you know, heart problems or or someone's traveling in remote areas, I'd encourage them to look at getting a defibrillator.
Jess McCall:
21:33-21:35
How much are they? Like, where can you get them?
Ross Smith:
21:35-22:24
They range from sort of a thousand dollars, 1500 dollars to $5-6,000 depending on they all do the same thing. There's a personal one out there as well now. I think it's called the Cell AED. I think that's six or seven hundred dollars like that. It sounds like a lot of money but it'll save your life right? You break it over stick it on your chest and it does everything for you and defibrillates you, and it's kind of the missing link in CPR we really need to have a defibrillator. So as we're starting to see more public access defibrillators out there we're seeing more lives saved around the world. You know, some parts of the world have massive amount of defibrillators, they're everywhere, and we're getting there slowly but surely here, but I just want people to be aware that you know that's all it does. Anyone can use it. You don't have be trained to use a defibrillator. They talk to you. You press the on button like any good household appliance Yeah. And it tells you what to do. Wish half my stuff at home would tell me what to do.
Jess McCall:
22:24-22:29
Exactly. And do you know how many there are in in South Australia?
Ross Smith:
22:29-22:44
I don't know, but there is registration now. A lot of there is a registration. I think it was a thing called Good Sam. There's a couple of other ones. I think a couple other organizations are setting up to have a monitor. I know that Greg, the yellow wiggle Yeah. He's got a, an app because he had a cardiac arrest.
Jess McCall:
22:44-22:45
Did he?
Ross Smith:
22:45-22:47
He off stage.
Ross Smith:
22:47-22:50
He and the only thing that saved his life was CPR and defibrillation.
Jess McCall:
22:50-22:50
Wow.
Ross Smith:
22:50-22:56
He was lucky there was a nurse there to do and and to assist, and he was lucky there was a defibrillator there.
Jess McCall:
22:56-22:56
Gosh.
Ross Smith:
22:56-23:02
So, yeah, I think heart of the nation, I think he's called. I'll I'll, you know, I'll check that, but and he's he's he's got an app. Right?
Jess McCall:
23:02-23:03
Yeah. Wow.
Ross Smith:
23:03-23:08
That actually will tell you where to, what to do and tell you where the where the fibrillators are located.
Jess McCall:
23:08-23:09
That's amazing.
Ross Smith:
23:09-23:18
Yeah. Yeah. So he's is passionate about I've spoken to Greg. He's passionate about people learning community CPR and learning how to use a defibrillator. Yeah.
Jess McCall:
23:18-23:36
Yeah. Gosh. Goodness me. So we've talked a lot about first aid and how important it is and how it can help the community. But for those listening, how can they actually learn first aid for themselves and then go out there and apply it in an easy way that's applicable to what whatever they do in the community?
Ross Smith:
23:36-25:33
Yeah. Sure. Look. We run regular first aid courses, which includes all first aid includes CPR so if you book into a first aid course it does have CPR with it you can book in just just a plain CPR courses go to our Surf Life Saving website website surflifesavingsa.com forward slash courses and we schedule regular courses. So they're all so workplace approved courses, but I also we're starting to run courses now community based and if there's parents out there, a parents group, your new mums group, if there's a childcare center or after school care, an OSH, and we've done one recently where we went in with the kids who are six to 11 Mhmm. Teaching them using a pillow how to do CPR, and they all went like, oh, this is really they all loved it. Right? But they got some knowledge out of it. So if anyone out there listening that wanted wants to that just give us a buzz on 83546900 and ask for me because I'm happy to do that or any community group like we've had, some neighborhood watch groups and you know some people getting into seniors wanting that they want to don't want to come in and do a workplace first aid but we know we charge a small fee and we'll go out and show them how to do CPR in case their loved one collapses right. So yeah first of all most importantly get to our website surflifesavingsa.com. Aucourses have a look what we've got if you can't see what you want give us a call and also they've simplified CPR and first aid you can actually do some online training now so all the theory you normally sit through hours and hours of it's online it's pretty easy to do, a multi choice question with videos once you've done that you can come into one of our classes I think CPR is an hour and a half now instead of a four or five hours and our first aid our we call provide first aid, which is your nationally accredited first aid, that's literally about four hours. So it's more practical based. So you come in and do the practical stuff rather than sit through the theory. So, yeah, it's really good. So encourage anyone to do that.
Jess McCall:
25:34-25:44
And what are some examples that you can think of off the top of your head of people who have learnt first aid from you guys at Surf Life Saving and then gone out and applied it and saved someone's life?
Ross Smith:
25:44-26:52
Yeah. Look. We don't get a lot of people ring back and say that they've done this because often people, you know, in shock or have had had nasty experience, but I've had several people in my lifetime say because you taught it so clearly I just listened to you say in my head stay calm, do what you can do, hold the pressure on the wound, and I've had several people call me back or write testimonials about that. We get testimonials here all the time and say how practical the course was. Think it's hard for us to gauge how many first aid incidents there are out there but the feedback we get is it's practical simple and practical and and that's what I love about like I said here the training is that it's not it's not comp too complex it's not theory based it doesn't need to be the more we slow it down and simplify it the better. Yeah and I've like stuff had a couple of great testimonials come back for people to say wow if it wasn't for you telling me this they would have choked to death or something would happen and it's great it's great feedback to have that you know it's it's it's a skill that everyone in Australia should have from small children right up to 90 or a hundred. I don't care how old they old you are. And particularly CPR, it's not hard. Alright?
Jess McCall:
26:53-27:13
Ross, it has been so great to be on the podcast today. Thanks for having me, and it's been awesome to hear your knowledge about first aid and CPR and just how important it is for everyone in the community to get behind it and to get behind Surf Life Saving SA as well. What is the best way for listeners to get in touch with you guys and book one of your courses?
Ross Smith:
27:13-27:26
Sure. I'm gonna get one more time because we're just gonna get people to go across this. SurfLifeSavingSA.com.au/courses, and they can book into a course there online themselves, or give us a buzz on 83546900.
Jess McCall:
27:27-27:34
Exactly. Well, that's it. Get behind it and learn first aid for yourself. It's a lot simpler than what it sounds.
Ross Smith:
27:34-27:35
It certainly is.
Jess McCall:
27:35-27:55
Well, thank you everyone for listening to this episode. It has been my pleasure to be your guest host today for Surf Talk and chat to Ross. If you enjoyed the podcast, please subscribe to get all our episodes for free, and feel free to share our podcast link to anyone you know because we wanna get share the word with as many people as possible.
Ross Smith:
27:55-28:11
We do Jess absolutely and look we're getting some good listeners here but we certainly would love you to share it if you like it share it. People, yeah our members are listening, some of our people on our social media are listening, we want people to share it that don't know about Surf Life Saving as well. It's so important.
Jess McCall:
28:11-28:12
Exactly. Gotta get the word out there.
Ross Smith:
28:12-28:24
So thank you, Jess. It's been a pleasure to have you here hosting. It's a change to be interviewed rather than me interview someone else. I hope you go well with all your endeavors with your BTS and every other journalist endeavors you're having in the future.
Jess McCall:
28:24-28:24
Thank you.
Ross Smith:
28:24-28:29
And it's nice to hear another voice doing the hosting. So thanks, Jess. I appreciate it.
Jess McCall:
28:29-28:30
I'm Jessica McCall.
Ross Smith:
28:30-28:31
And I'm Ross Smith.
Jess McCall:
28:31-28:36
And you have been listening to Surf Talk. Get inspired and get involved.
Ross Smith:
28:36-28:37
Thank you for listening.