This Week in EMS: A Recap for October 6-12 2007

EMS Expo 2007 opened this week in Orlando, Florida in conjunction with the NAEMT Annual Meeting and Firehouse Central. After two days of in-depth pre-conference workshops, the main EMS Expo conference and exhibit hall opened Thursday.

Feature presentations included the opening ceremony's keynote address and announcement of the winners of the annual EMT of the Year and Gold Service awards.

The keynote was provided by Loren Rourke, MD. She explained that her roots are in EMS and that the purpose of her talk, "Matt's Story," was to give EMS providers a glimpse of what results from their work.

"You bring these people to the hospital but nobody ever tells you how they did," she said. "Did they live, did they die, what happened to them?"

She provided this perspective by sharing the story of 19-year-old Matt Derrick of Knoxville, TN, who was involved in a major motor vehicle collision and a prolonged extrication, resulting in what were considered "unsurvivable" injuries.

She began by explaining his specific injuries and course of treatment. "For all intents and purposes Matt got crushed in this wreck," she said.

The award winners announced during the opening ceremony included Valerie DeFrance, EMT-P, for the Braun Industries/ZOLL Medical EMT/Paramedic of the Year Award. She was nominated five times, from her home in Hope, Alaska, to as far away as Texas and Washington, DC.

The winners of the Gold Service Award, which honors both a paid and a volunteer service, were Slaterville Volunteer Ambulance Inc., located in Slaterville Springs, NY, and Baxter Regional Medical Center Ambulance, located in north central Arkansas in the foothills of the Ozark Mountains.

To read more about Matt and about these exceptional EMS providers, visit the article EMS Expo 2007 Opens in Orlando.

Also this week, the new Executive Director of the National Association of EMTs was introduced at the NAEMT Annual Meeting, which is held in conjunction with EMS Expo.

"It's alphabet soup to me right now." That's how Pam Cohen, who is new to the industry, described her introduction to acronyms associated with EMS.

On her third day on the job, she promised the NAEMT Board of Governors that she learns quickly. "I've wrapped my arms around all those acronyms," she said.

Cohen, who holds a master's degree in strategic communications from Seton Hall, said it's been an exciting few days, and was warmly welcomed by the group.

To read more about Pam and this new development at NAEMT visit New NAEMT Executive Director Introduced at Annual Meeting/EMS Expo.

In the latest loss to the EMS community, a pilot, flight nurse and paramedic were killed late last week after their medical plane crashed in the rugged South San Juan Wilderness Area in southern Colorado.

The twin-engine Beechcraft King Air C90 was owned by Utah-based Eagle Air Medical Ambulance, and was headed to Alamosa, CO to pick up a patient for transport to Colorado Springs. Airport officials lost radio and radar contact with the plane at 11:22 p.m. Thursday. Investigators didn't know if the crew experienced problems prior to the crash.

The crew members were identified as pilot Ric Miller, flight paramedic Dana Dedman and flight nurse Ronnie Helton.

To read more visit the articles:

• Victims Named in Utah-Based Medical Plane Crash
• 3 In Crashed Medical Plane Found Dead

In a startling EMS incident this week, another school shooting took place in Cleveland, Ohio. A 14-year-old suspended student opened fire in his downtown high school Wednesday, wounding two teachers and two students before killing himself.

The student was suspended for fighting two days earlier and had made threats in front of students and teachers last week. He also had a history of mental health problems and threatened to commit suicide last year while in a mental health center, according to juvenile court records obtained by The Plain Dealer.