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Speaker 1: Care Flight has had its busiest year on record in

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Speaker 1: the Northern Territory with seven nine hundred patients retrieves retrieved,

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Speaker 1: I should say in twenty twenty three. No other service

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Speaker 1: does more than just rescuing patients as we know. And

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Speaker 1: joining me now is the general manager, Jody Mills.

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Speaker 2: Good morning, Jody, morning Katie. How are you going?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, really good, lovely to have you on the show, Jody.

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Speaker 1: Seven thousand, nine hundred patients in a year. How does

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Speaker 1: that compete to previous years? O, Katie.

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Speaker 2: We're probably up about five to ten percent. Although that

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Speaker 2: doesn't sound a lot, it's a lot when you go

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Speaker 2: down to the patient numbers. Yeah, and I think it's

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Speaker 2: not only I think every eramdical service across Australia is

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Speaker 2: seeing similar as well as all of the healthcare services.

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Speaker 2: So it's just been a busy year for ever. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: why do you reckon that is?

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Speaker 1: Why do you think you're seeing those increases?

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Speaker 2: Look, I think we certainly talk about the shadow pandemic

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Speaker 2: post COVID. More people presenting and needing to be to

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Speaker 2: come into hospital that perhaps hadn't hadn't been able to

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Speaker 2: access their care, or been or been scared to access

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Speaker 2: their care due to the COVID pandemic. But I think

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Speaker 2: also for us, the word about care Flight is out

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Speaker 2: there a lot more so we're also seeing we're seeing

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Speaker 2: a diverse range of referrals, you know, coming through via

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Speaker 2: our Triple O partners with Saint.

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Speaker 1: John's, and you guys do a phenomenal job and like

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Speaker 1: and such a wide range of work. I mean, I

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Speaker 1: know pilots that work for care Flight, I know nurses

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Speaker 1: that work for care Flight. I've been out there to

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Speaker 1: the hangar. The work that you do is absolutely fundamental

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Speaker 1: in the Northern Territory. Can you like talk us through

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Speaker 1: how wide ranging some of these jobs are.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely. Obviously there's those jobs that people say on

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Speaker 2: the on the front news, they're the ones that get

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Speaker 2: the attention. But every day we're going to people, up

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Speaker 2: to twenty two people a day with medical conditions. Are

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Speaker 2: the main things, things like heart attacks, patients who might

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Speaker 2: have had strokes, that kind of thing. That's what we

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Speaker 2: do most days. But apart from that, we obviously do

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Speaker 2: rescues with our helicopter. We do primary responses on the

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Speaker 2: roads to car accidents, we look for missing people. There's

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Speaker 2: a raft of things as you say that we can

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Speaker 2: provide the community.

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Speaker 1: And as you touched on, you know, some of those

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Speaker 1: huge incidents that the whole of Australia is looking at

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Speaker 1: at different times, you know, that are on the front

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Speaker 1: page of the paper that we're all reporting on. You

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Speaker 1: guys are there. They're helping people, whether they're territorians, whether

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Speaker 1: they're here visiting, whether they're here for work. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, and I think you know, we obviously responded to

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Speaker 2: a big incident last year and it doesn't matter who

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Speaker 2: it is. If they're in the territory and they're on

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Speaker 2: our roads, their territory ands. So we know we've got

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Speaker 2: a fantastic health system up here. So our job is

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Speaker 2: to get them to the to get our care, our

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Speaker 2: critical care to them on the side of the road

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Speaker 2: if that's where it is, and then bring them into

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Speaker 2: the hospital where they are going to get their ongoing

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Speaker 2: care needs supported.

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Speaker 1: Are there any like, are there any particular retrievals that

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Speaker 1: sort of stand out to you? I know that you know,

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Speaker 1: I know that you're even out there helping moms expecting

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Speaker 1: you know, expectant mums, I should say, sometimes when they're

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Speaker 1: in their hour of need as well, or when they

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Speaker 1: go into early labor. There's all sorts of scenarios.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, no, absolutely, and I think you actually hit the

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Speaker 2: nail on the head. That would have been the one

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Speaker 2: I would pick out as a used to be a

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Speaker 2: flight ness mid wife myself. We'll still still am. But yeah,

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Speaker 2: certainly when we deliver babies and there's there's those lovely outcomes.

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Speaker 2: But then this lead to you know, our crews see

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Speaker 2: some pretty big accidents and they do sit in your

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Speaker 2: mind as well, and we do wonder how people are going.

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Speaker 2: And we're lucky enough as you would have seen maybe

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Speaker 2: on our socials, we do have our patients come back

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Speaker 2: and talk with us, and that's so important for our

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Speaker 2: crews to see that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I reckon it would be, and just to see

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Speaker 1: the way that you change people's lives, you save people's lives,

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Speaker 1: right Like you know, it's one of those things where

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Speaker 1: if CareFlight weren't there to be really difficult for some territorians.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, And I think you know, we're two hundred

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Speaker 2: and fifty strong here in the Northern Territory as far

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Speaker 2: as employees go, so's it's the guy that on the

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Speaker 2: front line, but there there is such a huge team

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Speaker 2: in backer house that's helping, including obviously the engineers with

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Speaker 2: just six guys and all of the administrative stuff. So

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Speaker 2: I think sometimes the guys go about their business and

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Speaker 2: they're here to they are here to save life, but

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Speaker 2: they do forget that. They do forget some times that

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Speaker 2: we're not in a bad way in a way, that

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Speaker 2: this is what we're here for, this is just what

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Speaker 2: we do. They'll be those humble first responders as most

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Speaker 2: of us are, but you know, we're seeing people on

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Speaker 2: their worst dates and yeah, we need to remember and

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Speaker 2: we're very proud to be there for them.

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Speaker 1: Now. You know how important as well are those relationships

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Speaker 1: that you've got with you you know, like with remote clinics,

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Speaker 1: with the rangers, with Saint John's, like so many different

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Speaker 1: sort of there's so many different facets when it comes

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Speaker 1: to you know, to healthcare in the Northern Territory, but

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Speaker 1: everybody working together.

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Speaker 2: We couldn't do it without any of our any of

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Speaker 2: our supporters or the people that we work with within

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Speaker 2: the healthcare service. You know, Saint John's in us work

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Speaker 2: hand in hand and sometimes whilst we're making our way there,

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Speaker 2: Saint John's are already on the way, which is fantastic.

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Speaker 2: You know, we've got to get our aircraft there, so

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Speaker 2: we do duel response a lot of the time. So

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Speaker 2: those guys are just span has six supports to us. Obviously,

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Speaker 2: the DMOS and the clinics and the clinics staff are

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Speaker 2: again just another level for me. I've always said that

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Speaker 2: the nursing out in the communities, you know, it's a

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Speaker 2: tough gig and they are the ones. They're definitely first

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Speaker 2: on teams and then we come a little bit later,

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Speaker 2: so we couldn't do it without them, and it's not

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Speaker 2: unusual to have a multi system approach to it. And

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Speaker 2: certainly the regional hospitals in Taslingo Hospitals in Royal Darwin,

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Speaker 2: we also get stuff from there at times as specialists.

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Speaker 2: So we all work together, we're all part of the

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Speaker 2: network to provide the best care to Territorians.

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Speaker 1: Well, Jodie Mills, the Care Flight General Manager, wonderful to

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Speaker 1: talk to you this morning, and hats off to all

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Speaker 1: of the amazing care Flight stuff. I mean seven nine

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Speaker 1: hundred patient retrievals in twenty three it's an enormous number

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Speaker 1: and I know that you guys impact so many Territorians

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Speaker 1: lives in a really good way. You know, when they're

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Speaker 1: in their hour of need, care Flight is here to help.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Thanks so much, Katie, thank you