On December 18th at 9:10 p.m. on ORF 2
Vienna (OTS) – Christoph Feurstein presents “Theme” on Monday, December 18, 2023, at 9:10 p.m. on ORF 2 with the following contributions:
Family under the Christmas tree – what to do to make Christmas a success?
“We celebrate Christmas as a patchwork family, a total of four times in different places,” says actress Hilde Dalik. “I’m with my ex-husband on the 24th with our daughters, even though we’ve been divorced for 13 years,” says screenwriter and director Eva Spreitzhofer. It seems as if it is no coincidence that the two are currently celebrating success with the film “How do we get out of this?” in Austrian cinemas. The comedy about a blended family on Christmas Eve doesn’t leave out anything that can happen at such family gatherings. “All the expectations of the year are like water in a jug that overflows at Christmas,” says Jakob Kabas from Liezen in Styria. Eva Kordesch and Pia Bichara report on what he tries to do with his extended family to make Christmas a peaceful celebration and what advice couple therapists Sabine and Roland Bösel give.
The explosive danger on New Year’s Eve – a firecracker victim speaks
“It was a huge stupidity. “I can’t change it anymore, I can only warn others about it,” says Tobias Messerer. The now 17-year-old set off an illegal firecracker on New Year’s Eve a year ago at the Lichtenau sports field in the Waldviertel. He bought it with friends in a shopping center in the Czech Republic near the Austrian border. The forbidden explosive device explodes in Tobias’s hand. Doctors at the St. Pölten University Hospital fight for his life for two weeks: Tobias loses his right eye and his right hand. The blast tears a 5cm hole in his heart. “It is an injury typical of war. There is no case described in the literature where a person survives a hole of this size,” says heart surgeon Peter Bergmann. The Interior Ministry’s defusing service shows in “Thema” the power of such firecrackers and urgently warns against buying them. 200 people are injured every year; last year two young people died. Christoph Feurstein spoke to Tobias Messerer, his mother and the medical team.
New treatment methods for childhood cancer
“I want to be a pediatric surgeon! They took a tumor out of my stomach, I want to see it!” That’s what seven-year-old Talien says. The little girl was diagnosed with a twelve-centimeter neuroblastoma two years ago. The rare cancer of the nervous system was already very advanced. The intensive treatment, which has proven itself in international studies, lasted almost two years: chemotherapy, surgery, radiation, immunotherapy, nuclear medicine and two stem cell transplants. “Today we have many more options for treating these children,” emphasizes pediatric oncologist Gabriele Kropshofer. Talien is an example of how important scientific studies are, even for children. This is the only way experts can develop innovative treatment concepts, reports Sylvia Unterdorfer.