MDA israel

Each year throughout the summer vacation Magen David Adom holds its traditional summer courses in order to improve the medical skills and knowledge of MDA's youth volunteers. This year, 1,800 volunteers participated in the courses that ended with a ceremony held in the presence of senior members of MDA management as well as Shlomi Castro, Managing Director of Youth Organizations. 

Among the courses were a young leadership course, that teaches the students how to teach first aid training at events such as community days. A youth instructors course that prepares the participants to teach the younger youth volunteers during the school year as they prepare to join MDA as volunteers. And a disaster event leadership course, where the youth are trained to provide advanced treatments in a multi-casualty event or a disaster area without adequate medical equipment. Other youth volunteers also completed the MCI vehicle training and CPR courses. 

MDA's youth volunteers trialed advanced training equipment such as simulation programs and multimedia games using virtual reality (VR) technology that were developed specifically in order to improve training for the next generation of MDA. 

This is all on top of the 4,100 youth volunteers who completed their initial training at the start of the summer, following a year of study that exposed them to MDA, to extended educational content prior to their volunteering on ambulances. 

MDA Director General Eli Bin: "It's very exciting every year to see the youth using their summer vacation time by spending days and weeks in MDA, in order to learn, to volunteer and to give of their time, all in an effort to help save lives. MDA's strength relies on its people, and MDA's youth is a vital element within the organization. The summer months are highly significant in increasing the volunteers' preparedness, and to provide them with further tools in the mission to save lives."