Interview: Mrs. Williamson

Edward:	What qualifications do you have in Life Support?
Mrs. Williamson:	In Life Support I have Life Support 3, but I am a tutor. I teach life saving.
Edward:	So is Pool Life Guard above Life Support 3, if you like?
Mrs. Williamson:	LS3 is a prerequisite to take your Dry-Side part of Pool Lifeguard.
Edward:	OK I see. How are you currently and hoping to be involved with the RLSS?
Mrs. Williamson:	There's lots I want to do with the RLSS. We started a little life saving club, at Wentworth Junior School. We sent away and got some Lottery Funding, and at the moment Karen, her daughter and myself are doing 999 road shows. We go round Junior schools and we're actually teaching Life Support.
Edward:	Only for Junior Schools, or Senior too?
Mrs. Williamson:	Well, at the moment the Lottery Funding that Karen got was for the Maldon District. As I live in Colchester I would like to come into the senior schools. I had thought of asking at my sons school, St Benedict's, I can teach people, I already have some mannequins.
Sheldon:	Do you think there is an ideal age for teaching Life Support then?
Mrs. Williamson:	No I would honestly not say that. You can get Year 6 who are very keen, and we have taught loads of Year 6 Rescue-Breathing awards, which is before the Life Support award, where they can normally press down on an adult mannequin, but for the Rescue-Breathing we can teach them on a Junior mannequin, so they're still learning all the sequences. It could be one of their own family, and so there's always someone who has the skills.
Edward:	Could you outline what you've been nominated for in the RLSS?
Mrs. Williamson:	In April, is an AGM for the Essex branch of the RLSS. I've been asked to accept the post of President for the RLSS. That will go forward this April, and you usually get so many people in the audience who vote, and then I would become the president of the RLSS.
Edward:	OK, and how are you involved at the moment in Life Support. You are a teacher at Bramston and Blackwater in Maldon.
Mrs. Williamson:	I've been teaching Life Support for 27 years, and I started off myself going out to the club, because I just wanted a night out. I had a very young family, and I thought I'd have one night out a week, and I decided I'd go back into swimming. I started to go there, I took my Elementary Intermediate and Bronze Medal and I thought 'I don't know, I think...I could do that', so I decided I'd branch out and take my teachers. So I took my Teachers, no wait, I took my Examiners then my Teachers - I did it back to front. After that, I carried on taking the rest of the awards, merits, distinctions, bronze, silver...and I still hold a current pool lifeguard, which I take every year, even though it's meant to be every 2 years, I tend to take it every year because I teach it, so I like to take it every year.
Edward:	Would it be useful to have this site as a reference, to students who want to learn First Aid, and help teachers to keep up to date, and those who want to know if they should start First Aid and Life Support.
Mrs. Williamson:	I do really think this is a very good idea you're doing here. You have to liaise with the correct people to make sure you have the information correct, and then who you can put students who want to take the exams in touch with
Edward:	Are there any sections of this site you feel are most important?
Mrs. Williamson:	Straight away, I'd say CPR - because without CPR you're not going to save a life. For me as a life saving teacher, I'd class CPR as the most important. If you know about the triage, breathing over bleeding over bones over burns. So straight away that tells you breathing is the top priority, because if you deal with the breathing you can deal with the others.
Edward:	And the most forgotten?
Mrs. Williamson:	I think, especially in the bronze medallion award, we always used to learn about it, at that stage, we had to learn about the heart. We would learn which valves go where and which arteries go where, but now, you'd just say the heart is a muscular pump. But how many youngsters know what that heart is doing, and why we have to do that resuscitation. So I still think that learning the circuitry and the respiratory system should be taught. When I teach I still teach those two subjects as a bonus to the class.
Edward:	And is there anything else we may have missed?
Mrs. Williamson:	Well on your CPR, have you thought about if the casualty has a stoma? How you'd have to adapt to any resuscitation. Or if you were talking to people, are they deaf, or do they even speak our language? Because you can't just say that someone who is our colour, white, well we're not to discriminate - but that doesn't mean they speak English. So how good's your sign language?
Edward:	Non-existent!
Sheldon:	So you've obviously put a lot of hard work into learning all about Life Support, but have you ever been in a situation where you've had to use it?
Mrs. Williamson:	Well yes, on several occasions. I've had to deal with one which was in the water - an epileptic fit, he was in the recovery position, then we noticed he was going blue/mauve, and he stopped breathing. Some of the team ran to get the resuscitator, we used to use the oxygen tank, so we had no time to think about it, I just started mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Then there was a young girl who was choking, 11 months old, she swallowed part of a Satsuma she stole from her brother! The mother was panicking and running out of the house with her in the arms. I was indoors with my cup of tea and heard all this screaming, unusual screaming. I went to the door, and there was this mother with the baby in her arms. With that I just took the baby off her and I started to deal with the incident. We all made friends, she hadn't lived there very long so I didn't really know her. Following that, she got me to run a life support course that her and her friends and a load of mothers attended, which I taught from my house. So each week I had a load of mums round my house! Also a young girl who had a epileptic fit, who I was teaching canoeing, she went to capsize her canoe to do her 3 badges rescue sequence. She went into a fit, I had to jump in. She was all rigid and in the canoe so I couldn't get her out. We called for backup and finally got her out. Last Christmas, there was a car accident. A man was jammed in a car, I went forward and I asked if they needed help, “Yes, yes!” said one, who carried on running the other way - who I found out after was going to a garage round the corner to get more help. Two people were standing by the car, as if they were about to run away, and then the car bonnet was in flames. The man was screaming, “Get me out, Get me out!” . I tried to get him out but he was jammed. I think the people, when they saw the smoke, wanted to run away. My first instinct was to ask them to help me, I shouted at them - and we managed to get him out. Normally with a person in the car you don't move them, in case you cause a back injury, But in this case, I don't think I could sit there and watch him burn. I don't know what I'd have done if I couldn't pull him out. So we got him and took him away, in case the car went boom. So I got someone to support his head, and I got down to do a head-to-toe. He was absolutely screaming the whole time, and I was looking down his body, he was screaming all the time, and his hand, it was back-to-front, upside-down; a terrible state - it was broken. And by his ankle there was a drip of a blood, and I looked up his leg and there was a tiny hole, and I opened his trousers up with this and pulled them down. As I opened it up, his leg, it was totally open. It was a fractured knee, all totally cut open, and I told them to keep talking to him, as he was worried about his leg. 'It's fine, it's fine' I told him. So I asked for some bandages but there weren't any, so I ended up using tea towels! There was no-way I could cotton wool that. So I ended up covering it all with tea towels.
Edward:	So do you think there should be more first-aid boxes around, in case of these types of emergencies?
Mrs. Williamson:	Yeah, but also to know what to put in a first aid box. In that particular case, you know, well you wouldn't put a plaster on it, I needed bandages. I was almost at the stage of giving someone my car keys to get some bandages out of it, but it was at the other end of the road. I was actually in a traffic jam, and, I don't know what it was, but something made me get out of the car and see what was going on. You know, I don't know down to this day what made me get out of the car. I just sensed something wasn't right, and that's when I left my car.
Edward:	Like a law in France, where you have to carry a fluorescent jacket - do you think you should have a first aid box at all times?
Mrs. Williamson:	I do actually, because when we go abroad, you make sure you got all of them in your boot. There are automatic fines, you need your triangle, your jacket, your first aid box - you need the lot.
Edward:	Do you think they should be specific with what goes in the box? Perhaps not having too many plasters and not enough bandages? They could be rather useless when you have blood pouring out.
Mrs. Williamson:	You'd still want a plaster; you'd be surprised by the person with a little cut on their finger, who could go into shock. So just by putting that baby plaster on their finger, you've saved that life. Now I know that doesn't sound like much, to someone who doesn't care about it, but someone who does, could actually die. Shock can kill. Like now, in pool centres, in their first aid kits, we have a guidance cover, we write down what we want in there. And a lot of these centres are taking out scissors - which are still very important. But the reason they're taking them out is because they caught the lifeguards cutting their toenails with them! Maybe there should be a sign “DO NOT USE ON TOE NAILS”.
Edward:	Which part of the Life Support syllabus also is in the Rookie section?
Mrs. Williamson:	Well in the Rookies, those who are trying to get to star 4 actually take Life Support 1. Sometimes I don't teach them it, it depends, I'll put them in this class, and I'll say to them, how many have you got? Well this one's coming up...Well don't teach them that, they're only so old, as I won't be able to take them for their bronze medallion at that age, so I've got something to teach them later. If I've got an older child, which I have a few, and he's 14 but he's not coming up to you. His mum was asking to hold him back.
Edward:	Do you feel that students enjoy learning Life Support?
Mrs. Williamson:	Only some. You always get some, they get embarrassed. They don't like blowing on the doll - but once you get over that, you're well away.
Edward:	Would you advise your students to revise from this site before an exam?
Mrs. Williamson:	I always tell my students to revise before an exam.
Edward:	Do you find the changes to the syllabus difficult to keep up with?
Mrs. Williamson:	I don't find them difficult, but, the reason is that I go on lots of courses, and I'm always being kept up to date.
Edward:	Do you feel you'd be less sure about it if you didn't go on all these different seminars?
Mrs. Williamson:	Oh yes, if I didn't pay for these courses myself, to learn these things, it would be very hard.
Edward:	So it's hard to keep up to date with it if you don't go on all these courses. So how did all these changes affect you?
Mrs. Williamson:	It made it easier to teach. I gave students the choice whether to learn the new one early, or to stick to the old. Both sets did well.
Edward:	Did it confuse the rookies?
Mrs. Williamson:	No because I always give my groups handouts, I always photocopy whatever I do for myself. When they first start out as rookies, I give them a little folder. Every time I give them a handout, whether it be about bleeding or how many bandages we use, I teach them everything.
Edward:	Do you think it should be compulsory to teach everyone about Life Support?
Mrs. Williamson:	Yes.
Edward:	Do you think it shows a certain character, for those people who actively go out to get Life Support training?
Mrs. Williamson:	I do, I think it shows strength. A strong character.