History of the medical services in the Austrian fire services

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The medical service no longer has this importance for the general public in the Austrian fire service, but in most cases only serves as support and protection for its own team within the fire service . For some years now, every new member of the fire service has completed a somewhat extended first aid training course, which is part of the basic training, but today this serves not only for self-protection but also for improved cooperation in operations in which paramedics and emergency doctors are also deployed.

Medical service until the First World War

Even in the fire regulations before the fire departments of Cisleithania were founded, doctors were obliged to present themselves at the fire site with bandages. When the fire brigades were founded, the doctors themselves trained paramedics to support them , which subsequently led to the formation of their own rescue departments.

According to the Reichsgemeindegesetz of 1862, the municipalities were not only responsible for fire protection, but also for sanitation. For this reason, it was obvious that the fire brigade should offer its medical departments, initially set up for its own men, also for special services outside of the fire operation, such as the ambulance, especially for the poor. During this time, the Red Cross was founded , with which more and more people worked together.

The first trained medical departments have been known in Klagenfurt since 1866, in Krumau in 1869 , in Bohemian Leipa and in Trieste in 1870 . From 1875, the medical services were increasingly taken into account in the training, as well as their equipment and organization. In these regulations it was already described which material had to be kept in stock by a fire brigade or how a first aid station was to be set up near a fire site. It is generally assumed that around 1880 all fire brigades were equipped with the essentials for medical supplies. The Austrian Red Cross was also founded in 1880 . Czermack , who ran the association of state fire brigade associations around this time, was also an advocate of fire-fighting rescue services. He therefore proposed the following expansion of the statutes to the associations:

“Assistance with any kind of natural forces and accidents; Training of members in the quick and correct delivery of assistance; Arranging the local transport of wounded and sick warriors from the train stations to the military and club sanitary facilities and to private care and vice versa; Support for the purposes of the Society of the Red Cross "

- Reginald Czermack

The teaching aid subsequently created by Josef Horner from Zwickau won the gold medal at the hygiene exhibition in Leipzig in 1891.

In 1892 there was an agreement between the Standing Austrian Fire Brigade Committee and the Austrian Society of the Red Cross on the formation of "Local Ambulance Transport Columns" , which was ratified shortly afterwards by the Imperial and Royal War Ministry. These columns only had to be set up in places or cities designated by the ministry as hospital locations.

This team was divided into patrols of three men each. Five patrols made a train or a column. The clothing consisted of the fire brigade clothing with an armband with the Red Cross. They were mostly trained by military doctors. In the years 1892/93 there were already 1,085 paramedics working in 53 columns.

In 1893, however, it was decided that the medical service should not be limited to the agreed hospital locations, but that every fire brigade had to set up a medical department. The size of the department was based on the general size of the fire brigade. In villages only one or two men were sufficient, in larger cities 12 to 15 men were necessary. However, they did not wear an armband with the usual "Red Geneva Cross", but with a red Samaritan cross. Since the fire brigades usually only had stretchers or wheeled stretchers, agreements had to be made with the truckers who carried out the actual transports.

Advertising stamp for the fair in Berlin

In 1900 the Red Cross decided to expand peacekeeping . The model of cooperation also caused a sensation at the International Exhibition for Fire Protection and Rescue in 1901 in Berlin . At the end of 1901 there were 73,019 paramedics among the 387,750 active firefighters, also known as Samaritans. Larger departments employ their own horse-drawn ambulances as well as horses.

In 1905, Emperor Franz Joseph donated the medal for twenty-five years of work in the field of fire and rescue services , thereby underlining the connection between the two tasks. Around 1910 the statutes of the Red Cross are expanded so that the following firefighters are also members of the Red Cross:

"Ordinary members are the medical teams of the volunteer fire brigades or their rescue departments, which have joined the association with the obligation to perform the rescue service in the name and under the sign of the Red Cross, they enjoy for the duration of their membership in the rescue departments mentioned for their own Person who is a member of the association without any obligation to pay a special annual fee. "

The first rescue vehicles came into use from 1912, such as in Linz or in 1914 in Salzburg, although their use turned out to be very expensive compared to horse-drawn vehicles.

In 1913, some larger rescue departments had separated from the Red Cross and wanted to join together in Samaritan state associations , which in turn wanted to join together to form an Austrian Samaritan Association. However, the highest bodies of the fire brigade did not support this project. On the other hand, however, the state fire brigade associations took note of when not only departments, but entire fire brigades also joined the Red Cross.

At the II. International Congress for Rescue Services and Accident Prevention in Vienna in 1913, Czermack was able to give a lecture on the advantages of joint action by the fire brigade and the rescue service. In 1914 an agreement was concluded between the fire brigade and the Red Cross to harmonize training guidelines.

Service in the First World War

Ambulance of the FF Ravelsbach in the First World War

The fire brigade had to pass its test during the First World War . The main problem was the lack of staff, as many of the active fire brigade paramedics had to call in. Czermack, already 67 years old, moved to Vienna, where he set up an office for the rescue column committee of the Austrian Society of the Red Cross in the function of an inspector of all rescue services throughout the monarchy . At the end of 1914 there were 605 columns that had to be increased even further. Only a few larger columns could be motorized. In 1915, when the up to 50-year-olds had to enlist, the reservists were called in again for the medical service. Since many trains also carried wagons with the wounded, permanent services were set up in the stations. After all, the fire brigade also had to operate refreshment points at the train stations.

With the signing of the armistice on November 3, 1918, the local ambulance columns ceased operations, while the fire brigade rescue departments continued their work.

During the war, 867 columns (822 only provided by fire brigades) with 12,947 members (previously over 30,000) were deployed. In the balance sheet that Czermack drew up when he left after the war, one finds "7,466,681 wounded people transported, 8,684,496 treated and looked after, as well as 74,726 wound dressings replaced and 83,108 files dealt with at the headquarters."

Interwar period

The number of members of the Austrian Reich Association for Fire and Rescue Services was greatly reduced by the St. Germain Peace Treaty . The association itself was reconstituted under the same name on August 20, 1920. After the chaos of war, the rescue service was still an essential part of the fire brigade's duties. The financial aspect was also of particular interest to the larger fire brigades. Since the transports were largely paid for, the fire brigade received additional funds for the equipment. On the other hand, the Red Cross was also looking for new tasks. For example, the training of the medical departments was partly carried out by the Red Cross. In return, however, large fire departments should remain members of the Red Cross and also participate in the implementation of collections. Numerous agreements between the state fire brigade associations and the WCC sought to create clearer guidelines. The rescue conference in Salzburg in 1922 was a milestone in these negotiations. While the rescue organizations tried to take over the medical services, the fire brigade defended the agreement concluded in 1914, according to which they had to carry out these activities. In the end, only a very defused proposal was accepted, in which the cooperation between all organizations active in the rescue sector should be significantly increased.

In the following years, the training of paramedics was converted to new organizational forms and thus professionalized and institutionalized. Paramedics got the opportunity to volunteer at the Vienna Voluntary Rescue Society.

In 1931, a general road rescue service was introduced on roads . With this, the tasks of the fire brigade within the framework of the Red Cross suddenly increase. At certain marked points on the streets, two paramedics who were equipped with bandages had to be on duty. This mainly affected places with high traffic during the travel season. The paramedics were also used at events, such as the first car race on the Grossglockner High Alpine Road , which took place in 1935.

In 1935 and 1936, the two state fire brigade associations Salzburg and Burgenland were removed from the association law and became associations under public law . This also gave them the legal mandate for both fire extinguishing and rescue services. Separate rescue departments were prescribed for all fire departments.

In the German Empire

Immediately after the connection , there were fears that the fire brigade would be deprived of the rescue service, which also happened. In August 1938 it was announced that the medical services would be completely taken over by the German Red Cross and that the fire brigade would continue to carry out this activity until the DRK was fully expanded in the Ostmark . With the establishment of the DRK, all equipment and medical supplies should be handed over to it. However, since there were no DRK facilities at all, a large part of the equipment remained in the fire stations. In October 1939, the order from 1938 was canceled until further notice and the fire brigade had to do the medical service again despite the establishment of the DRK, which the fire brigade had to support.

With the beginning of the war the construction of the DRK accelerated and the fire brigades had to announce the names of their paramedics. In fact, it was mainly equipment from the motorized rescue departments that was taken over, while the small fire brigades carried out their medical services at local level as before throughout the war.

post war period

Since the laws from before the Anschluss came into force in the other areas too, the fire brigade initially assumed that the medical service would continue as it did before the war. In fact, the Red Cross was able to gain a foothold quickly and built up the medical services for the general public itself and there was a cooperation between volunteer fire brigades and the Red Cross, who have since performed their separate areas of responsibility and work together where necessary. Today there is only the Admont Volunteer Fire Brigade in Austria , which has its own rescue department. FF-Admont operates the rescue service for the Admont fire brigade section (5 municipalities, approx. 6500 inhabitants) and is equivalent to the Red Cross as an emergency organization. In addition, the Linz Chemical Park is supplied by the local company fire brigade.

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Concern about the rescue in the Kleine Zeitung of October 29, 2017, accessed on October 29, 2017
  2. ^ BTF Chemical Park Linz. Retrieved February 3, 2020 .

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