Independently Owned, Locally Grown, Community Loved
Adrien holds a long service medal. Photo Credit: Tully Beach Mission LAC
Local paramedic Adrien House has just received a long service medal, celebrating 30 years of dedication and compassion in the Queensland Ambulance Service.
Adrien began his career training and working in Cairns before finding his long-term home in Mission Beach.
Balancing a personal life and work life is a hard task for many front-line workers, but Adrien shared that it can be more manageable in a rural community.
“I came from Cairns to Mission Beach, thinking it’d only be a brief stint at a smaller location,” Adrien said.
“But I soon realised that it's a great work-life balance, a really nice community and a good mixture of workload.”
Since joining the Mission Beach station at 33, Adrien has built lasting connections with members of the community, often meeting them at their most vulnerable. While these relationships make the role deeply rewarding, it can also be a challenge.
“Working in a small community is both a positive and negative. You get to have connections with people, and then you're seeing those same sort of people go through medical emergencies and the worst time of their lives”
For Adrien, the rewards of rural paramedicine extend far beyond the flashing lights, with the quieter acts of care holding just as much significance as the high-pressure emergencies.
“Some of the work might be seen as not the sort of flashy lights and sirens stuff that you see on TV. Often, it can be just, you know, taking an elderly person for a specialist appointment, but I see both things as equally important.”
With over three decades in the field, Adrien has many tips to share with anyone pursuing a career in paramedicine. For example, looking after yourself so that you can look after others; staying fit and prioritising your well-being so you can de-stress from front-line service.
“I can get out of paramedic mode into father-partner mode and sort of put work behind me for the week.” Adrien shared.
“It's a structured thing I do after each rotation, and for me, I kind of see it as a bit of a reset, going into days off and onto the other side of me, which isn't a paramedic.”
It seems that being in a frontline service runs in Adrien's blood. The son of a firefighter and a nurse, he joked that he had been a paramedic since the age of eight, having grown up immersed in the everyday qualities of care and sympathy.
“I liked what they were doing for a living, and I think being a paramedic is kinda like somewhere in the middle of those two professions,” Adrien said.
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