John,
Having flown B200 for the NTAMS (Northern Territory Aerial Medical Service) which is much the same as RFDS and RPT Dash8, my take would be ....
Aeromedical can give one a great sense of community service. Some places are interesting, others demoralising. My shifts, almost all on-call, in the early 90's were something like, 5days 0600-1800, 2days off, 5 nights 1800-0600, 3 or 4 days off, start all over again.
Some times one wouldn't fly for two weeks, other times one was shagged. Overall, I though it a great lifestyle for a family person, as signifficant time home was available to spend with partner/kids, though it could be a little uncertain.
The down sides are, being on-call for night shift, where the phone inevitably goes just after you get into bed. I recall one night where I did 3 separate retrievals, each one being phoned through after returning to bed from the previous sortie.
By the time I left in June '95 I was quite saddened that much of our work was as a result of alcohol abuse.
Now, DH8 RPT. That was most enjoyable. The Dash is a great machine with no vices that come to mind, save it being a prick-of-a-thing to land smoothly.