VIDEOS "VIENNA HEALTH AWARD 2023"

Roswitha Zink: I’m from the Lichtblickhof – a farm in Vienna’s 14th district, located on the grounds of the former Otto Wagner Hospital. Our project is called “Lichtblickwichteln.” We support children and young people who are facing life and death – whether they’re caring for a sick parent, have lost a loved one, have a seriously ill sibling, or are living with cancer themselves. There’s always a lot to do on the farm. The focus is on working together – so that animals and people can defy the odds together. That’s really what it’s all about. The connection with the animals is the most powerful thing – feeding them, working in the garden, harvesting vegetables, picking dandelions for the rabbits. These are simple, practical tasks. But while doing them, some very deep, personal and philosophical conversations take place. Lichtblickhof relies on donations and volunteer work. We’re incredibly grateful for all those who support us. And we’re humbled to see this place continue growing. The animals and this place have something magical – a “stardust strength,” if you will – for people whose life paths haven’t been straight or easy.

Sreco Dolanc: Hello, my name is Sreco Dolanc. I’m a licensed pharmacist – in fact, Austria’s only deaf pharmacist. I work at the Marien Pharmacy in Vienna’s 6th district. My native language – like for many deaf people – is sign language. In the deaf community, having your own language is essential: it’s how we share knowledge, get information, and communicate meaningfully. Unfortunately, there aren’t many resources for deaf people when it comes to learning about health – because most information isn’t available in sign language. That makes it harder to build health literacy and confidence when making decisions. At Marien Pharmacy, we asked ourselves: where can we start to change that? We realized how important it is to start with children. So we created workshops for deaf and hard-of-hearing kids and teenagers, where they could get involved and learn actively. We also published a children’s book – it’s very visual and easy to understand. And we made a flipbook about medicinal plants that shows signs for herbs, as well as how they’re used and what they do. We’re proud to support health education, accessibility, and community empowerment.

Susanna Pokorny: My name is Susanna Pokorny, and I’m a vocational school teacher. Our project focuses on children's dental health. We developed a program that gives preschoolers a positive experience with dental care – before fear of the dentist can even arise. At the same time, I wanted to show my vocational students how important they are – that younger children look up to them, and that their role in society matters. It was great to see how open and curious all the children were – and how open my students were, too. Leading a group isn’t easy at first, and we weren’t sure how they’d handle it. But they did an amazing job. Now, when I pick up my own children from preschool, lots of kids run up to me and proudly say, “I brushed my teeth today!” or “I went to the dentist!” They’re excited to talk about it now.

Jan Peter Pech: We are the Ackerhelden – “heroes of the field” – and we organize urban gardening projects, mostly in Vienna. Petra Zehentner and the Ackerhelden have been working together for two or three years now. Petra was one of our first garden members. We run organic gardens for private households – that’s how most people know us. But we also do environmental education. Petra works for Platus Learning Systems, one of Austria’s leading providers of augmentative and alternative communication. She’s also the mother of Johannes, a nonverbal child who communicates differently. He joined her often in our gardens. Petra said she wanted to give Johannes access to nature and the outdoors. So in December 2021 – in freezing cold weather – we met on one of our plots to brainstorm how we could make our gardens more accessible and inclusive. We used talking buttons, Metacom symbols, and built an info board with visual aids. Metacom is a symbol system designed for accessible communication. We also used sensory storytelling techniques – including scents, textures, and movement. Each child is different – they react in different ways, have different needs and interests. For some, just being able to get out of their wheelchair was a powerful experience. The garden was a safe space to explore, learn, and hopefully make beautiful memories.

Eva Trettler: The Institute for Women’s and Men’s Health has set itself the goal of promoting a healthy lifestyle among girls and boys, women and men, in accordance with WHO guidelines, which emphasize mental, social, and physical health. In addition to counseling services, we also offer courses, workshops, and implement various projects aimed at promoting health. This is how the project SiBa – Secure Base for Children of Parents with Mental Illness came into being. Ultimately, it was an initiative by three female doctors at the Ottakring Clinic. These were Dr. Susanne Hölbfer, Dr. Astrid Ladurner-Mittnik, and Dr. Claudia Reiner-Lawugger. In cooperation with the Vienna Women’s Health Program and the Health Goals initiative, the Institute for Women’s and Men’s Health is now allowed to implement the project. We want to support the families. We offer group sessions that focus primarily on communication and talking about emotions. Also very important: informing children about the illness. In most cases, feelings of guilt, anxiety, and uncertainty arise. Through our group sessions, children and families learn that they are ultimately not alone in dealing with the issue. The project has gratefully been funded by the FGÖ.

Benedikt Meyer-Weitkamp: I work for the organization Balu & Du. This is a non-profit association for children’s and youth work in Vienna, based in Simmering. We have been providing open children’s and youth work since 1994. In our program mojosa, we work with the target group of children aged 6 to 14. They can access our services four times a week at two different locations. The project Football & You was designed by my former colleague Lenka Pedemonte, in the context of the MA 13 annual focus on “health literacy” for 2021/22. She introduced the method Fútbol por la Paz, which ultimately is about promoting fair, friendly, and honest football, as opposed to performance-driven football. That means it's not only goals that count toward winning, but there is also a fair play rating, in which the participants assess and evaluate themselves afterward, based on fair play rules that are defined in advance together with the entire group before each training session. Accordingly, once a week on Thursdays during the summer months, we hold a football training session as part of our park supervision. We start together, define the rules together, spend one to one and a half hours doing various exercises and training, and then play a final match where the fair play rules are particularly emphasized. This process encourages a lot of reflection and discussion among the participants.

Michaela Waiglein-Wirth: I am the coordinator of Wiener Kinderfreunde aktiv for the district of Favoriten, and we are responsible for the leisure-time educational projects that Favoriten offers. The children come to us with many ideas. One of these ideas was to create a Food Week for children with sustainable, unusual, alternative food items – allowing the children to try things they might otherwise never have tasted, or have never tasted before in their lives. In the first Food Week, we worked with Hut & Stiel to introduce oyster mushrooms in various processed forms to the children – for example: oyster mushroom pesto, sausages made from mushrooms, and a mushroom-based sauce. The startup beSonder provided us with beverages, which meant we could offer a selection of ginger-fruit drinks. The children and youth explained to all of us – very expressively – that this was the first time they had tasted ginger, and also the first time they had engaged with mushrooms. They were not at all familiar with this kind of flavor, and discovered that it could be something that expands their diet. We received feedback that there should be another Food Week the very next week – again with such extraordinary and unconventional food items for our target group. And the children literally devoured everything.

Stephan Gremmel: The neunerhaus Health Center and the Vinzenz Group have been cooperating for many years in the medical care of homeless people and those without health insurance. In 2021 – right in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic – we decided to expand the cooperation to include the dock social and health practice, where people who currently do not have health insurance can also receive specialist medical assessments and social work counseling. The goal of the project is simply to provide everyone with access to healthcare – and to do so in a way that functions just as it does for insured individuals. Currently, dock offers ophthalmological, gynecological, and orthopedic assessments. In addition, we also provide internal medicine and neurology services. All of this is supported by qualified health and nursing staff. In individual cases, it is also possible to organize physiotherapy. In addition to the volunteer specialists working there, dock also has a permanent team of medical assistants and social workers who help people feel welcome and are available for social counseling in psychosocial matters – which are often very closely linked to health issues.

Agnese Zotti: At school, it's not just about learning mathematics, physics, biology, English, French, Spanish, or whatever else. Children and adolescents need to be given the tools – let’s call them instruments or whatever we like – to simply get through life better. Crises will keep coming. We don’t need a second pandemic, but crises will always return. And it’s absolutely essential that people learn to understand the instruments they need to deal with these crises. We managed, primarily through voluntary donations from the parents’ association and the parents themselves, to have two psychologists, psychotherapists, in the school building two days a week. In addition, they were available for workshops for the children on various mental health topics. There were parents who chose the Radetzky-Gymnasium specifically because of this project. Because not only, as mentioned, are mathematics, Spanish, French, and all kinds of other subjects taught and learned, but there’s also attention paid to the fact that we care about how we’re doing, how we interact with one another, how we deal with our problems, and how we express our bad moods.

Karin Klenk: I’m from the Municipal Department 15, the public health service of the City of Vienna. And in the last government agreement, it was established that school nurses should be implemented in Vienna’s schools. School nurses are certified health and nursing professionals who take care of children in schools – children and adolescents with chronic conditions, such as diabetes or asthma, migraines, but they also provide emergency care. For example, if children or adolescents have stomachaches, headaches, or sustain an injury during class, they can visit the school nurse at any time and receive professional care. Another important point is, of course, health literacy and health promotion. And it's also especially important that the school nurse serves as a trusted person for the children, separate from teachers who grade them. The school nurse has been very well received by the children and adolescents. At the beginning, of course, there was a lot of curiosity – who is this new person at the school? And they went to take a look at the school nurse. But after a few days, they already recognized her on the street, were happy to see her, and by now, they come to the school nurse on their own if they have a problem, if they want to confide in someone – or even accompany another child to the school nurse because they simply like going there. So she’s truly become a trusted person, and the children and adolescents are really making great use of that.

Karin Korn: The Wiener Stadtwerke Group is the largest municipal infrastructure service provider. We keep Vienna running every day. The project “Healthy Together – Talk to Us!” involved five companies from the group joining forces: Bestattung Wien (Vienna Funeral Services), Friedhöfe Wien (Vienna Cemeteries), Wiener Lokalbahnen (Vienna Local Railways), Wiener Lokalbahnen Cargo, and WIPARK Garages. We asked ourselves: How can we better reach employees who are hard to reach due to their work, with targeted health promotion measures? At the beginning, managers were sensitized and introduced to the project – what their role and function in the project would be. Then, selected employees were offered health circles, moderated discussion rounds. These were about identifying health resources on the one hand, but also health-related stressors, and – the special part – also developing solution proposals. Action plans were developed, which led to concrete implementations, such as adjustments to duty rosters, improvements to work tools, and also improvements or optimizations in communication and the way information is shared. These are all very important, health-promoting factors in the workplace.