Ambulance Victoria supporting DonateLife Week

Ambulance Victoria paramedic Chloe Brennan together with Commissioner of

Emergency Management Victoria Andrew Crisp.

It wasn’t a difficult decision for Chloe to pursue a career as a paramedic. Following the sudden death of her beloved younger brother Mitchell in 2010, Chloe decided to follow the dream her brother had – to help others and make a difference as a qualified paramedic.

While Mitchell’s life was sadly cut short at the age of 18, he made a tremendous difference to others by becoming an organ donor in death.

Chloe says they had never discussed organ donation as a family, and she is now urging all Victorians to do exactly that – especially young adults.

“It’s not something that young people ever really talk about. Not because it’s a taboo subject; it’s more the thinking that ‘it’s not going to happen to me’, so the conversation never takes place,” says Chloe.

“It’s not the conversation we got to have in our family, but because of Mitchell’s extremely caring nature, and the career path we knew he wanted to go into, the decision to say ‘yes’ to organ donation was a no-brainer for us,” she says.

“It was something he would have put his hand up straight away to do. He would have wanted to help others.”

“I love my job, and yes, it makes me sad to think that he hasn’t been able to experience being a paramedic. However, I’m so proud that he has been able to help others through becoming an organ donor,” says Chloe.

“He never got to fulfil his career dreams, but he was still able to help others.”

Register to become an organ and tissue donor in less than a minute at donatelife.gov.au or via the Medicare Express Plus app on your mobile phone.

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