Life in HEATTECH with Allison Cole
Jul 08, 2020
LifeWear
Find out how everyday people wear UNIQLO's HEATTECH.
Allison wears Women’s HEATTECH Ultra Warm Crew Neck T-Shirt and Women’s HEATTECH Ultra Warm Leggings underneath her Royal Flying Doctor Service uniform.
UNIQLO is led by the brand’s philosophy of LifeWear where clothing is designed to make everyone’s life better. It is simple, high-quality, everyday clothing that is inspired by life’s needs. This winter, UNIQLO is featuring conversations with real, everyday people who work, play and live in our HEATTECH range. UNIQLO’s HEATTECH range, driven by technology and innovation, serves as a base layer or thermal to help keep you warm during the colder months.
Allison Cole is part of the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS) Mobile Patient Care Road Ambulance crew where as a Patient Transport Officer, she provides non-emergency patient transport for people across metro and regional Victoria who need medical assistance and care to or from a medical facility.
Currently in her second year of a degree in paramedicine, balancing her role at RFDS and study has enabled Alli to put into practice the technical skills she learns with no two days or patients being the same.
As an iconic Australian not-for-profit that UNIQLO Australia has worked closely with during the COVID-19 pandemic, UNIQLO Australia speaks with Alli about the importance of RFDS and how it is serving the local community.
How did you end up as a paramedic?
I grew up in a little town outside of Dallas, Texas in the USA. I moved here to Australia about eight years ago and I’ve always wanted to help people. I think growing up in the south in America, you kind of get a little bit of a server's heart, so you want to serve. I kind of took the long way to get here. I worked in hospitality for about 20 years and finally tugged on my heartstrings to make the jump and ended up in education to lead down this pathway of being paramedic.
You work in the Mobile Patient Care operations at RFDS, for those who don’t know, why is the RFDS such a crucial service?
The Royal Flying Doctor Service is crucial for so many reasons. Basically, more than 90 years ago a man called Reverend John Flynn decided that he wanted to bridge the gap between rural outback and metro health amenities. He recognised that people weren’t able to access healthcare out in rural communities and he made it possible by developing the first civilian aeromedical service in the world, converting a QANTAS plane to transport people from remote areas to the city for medical treatment.
Today, more than 90 years later, we provide healthcare to almost all corners of Australia. It’s not just transporting patients, we also now provide preventative healthcare and services like mental health, speech pathology and dental care.
We also educate children through our children’s programs. I think the Flying Doctor is woven into the fabric of Australia now.
When you live in metropolitan Melbourne or other cities around Australia, you have all the amenities for healthcare or any kind of care that you need. Then you think about rural Australia where they’ve got very little, and rely on telehealth or the need to travel hundreds of kilometres for services, which is crazy!
What motivates you every day and what is the most rewarding part of the job?
I think the people do, for sure! I love helping people. I think that the opportunity to meet people at their most vulnerable state and then provide some sort of service whether it be healthcare or just someone to be there for them. It’s people to people service really - and gives them that opportunity to relax a little bit and be a part of the process as well.
Vulnerability is incredible. It’s just such an honour to be invited into that and then to be one of the people who help that person as they walk through things that they didn’t know they were going to walk through.
Your job requires you to service those in remote and regional areas, where has it taken you?
The Royal Flying Doctor Service is about taking healthcare rural and we all eventually do get that. We also have a heap of metro transfers – but yes, we all eventually do go rural.
Since I’m focused in metro Melbourne, my vicinity is Victoria, so I’ve gone to pretty much all of the regions in Victoria. To be honest, with COVID things are a little bit different with borders and whatnot.
Yes, we can cross borders for healthcare but we do a lot of rendezvous where we hand over a patient and they take them the rest of the way. It’s been good to meet people that you wouldn’t have otherwise – but yeah, we have coworkers everywhere - in every state.
What are some of the biggest challenges of the job?
We do long hours but physically it’s not that intensive. I think Australia has moved into a place of work health and safety where manual handling is limited and everything we do is very safe. We do everything as a team.
The hardest part is maybe mentally, like when you pick up a patient from an aged care facility or wherever and introduce yourself, they introduce themselves, and you become part of this relationship with this patient.
Once you spend many hours in the truck, building this beautiful rapport, then you drop them off to the next destination and do a handover with the nurse, then that’s it. Then you’re onto the next patient.
Sometimes you even go home and you wonder if that patient is alright and if they’re going to recover. That feeling of not knowing is hard. Other than that, it’s the most rewarding and memorable gig EVER. It’s insane.
For those late-night trips, how do you stay warm out on the road?
Well, of course, we have the heater cranked in the truck for ourselves and the patient of course first. But for me, honestly – I wear HEATTECH from UNIQLO. I started wearing HEATTECH about two years ago when I got into uni, under my paramedic uniform.
It’s awesome. It’s flexible, it’s breathable, it’s moveable, it’s hygienic. With COVID when we have our big Tyvek suits on and we’re decontaminating the truck, you sweat a little bit, but if it’s a really cold day you wear your long sleeve HEATTECH and for me, by the grace of goodness, it doesn’t smell. It keeps me warm and keeps me clean.
Alli uses the items below from UNIQLO’s HEATTECH range:
Women’s HEATTECH Ultra Warm Leggings
Women’s HEATTECH Ultra Warm Crew Neck T-Shirt
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