Saving heart muscle just became easier

Blocked arteries deprive the heart muscle of much-needed oxygen. That's the basic concept of a heart attack. If the blockage persists, the heart muscle will die. Preferred treatment is the placement of a stint or balloon angioplasty which effectively reopens the vessel—a procedure called percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). In the past, when a person would present to the ER with a heart attack, it could sometimes take an hour or two to confirm the heart attack and assemble the cardiac catheterization team—depleting precious minutes and precious heart muscle as well. Now, there's a better way.

Using specially-designed cellular modems generously provided by Norton Hospital, paramedics from Oldham County EMS can now transmit the EKGs directly to the awaiting hospital, allowing the ER time to assemble the PCI team and prepare for the patient. The medics can then bypass the ER and take the patient to a waiting cardiac catheterization table where treatment can begin immediately. The gold standard adopted by the American Heart Association is treatment within 90 minutes of hitting the door of the hospital (referred to as Door-to-Balloon time). With advanced notification, Oldham County EMS can greatly reduce even the gold standard. The end result is that we can help more people survive a heart attack that would have been fatal in the past.

Oldham County EMS introduces new protocols

As of July 1, 2009, Oldham County EMS will be operating off a new, more progressive set of protocols than ever before. The new protocols include EZ-IO-drills, Drug Assisted Intubation (DAI) and Rapid Sequence Intubation (RSI) medications, and advanced pain management. BLS members will be able to administer epinephrine for anaphylaxis, provide Albuterol treatments for asthmatic patients, and give aspirin for initial treatment of heart attacks.

Also, as noted above, the medics will be able to transmit 12-lead EKGs directly to hospitals, thus expediting the activation of cardiac catheterization labs. In doing so, valuable time — and heart muscle — can be saved.

Expanded training section

While our primary training goal is to provide high-quality classroom instruction, we're in the process of moving those trainings to DVDs and the web as well. This not only makes the training more accessible to our employees, but the general public as well.

We're also in the final stages of designing what we're calling Life Trainings. While medical training is important, factors outside of the workplace also effect the lives of our employees. The topic for these classes will include nutrition, budgeting/home finance and conflict resolution to name but a few.

iStan

The department is currently in the final stages of purchasing iStan, a sophisticated cutting-edge medical simulator designed specifically for EMS and emergency room personnel. Made possible through the generosity of the Hospital Emergency Response Association and the Baptist Hospital Foundation, the iStan simulator will allow the service to add realistic scenarios to our training. We will become the only EMS service in the state to have such a state-of-the-art training aid.

It's very amazing technology...a sophisticated blend between a Resusci Annie and a robot. The simulator is controlled wirelessly by a computer and includes on-board fluid, pneumatic and electrical systems. It can cry, drool, bleed, seize, and breath at the click of a mouse.

The technology behind the simulators was originally developed for the U.S. Army to help train their doctors, nurses and medics. Their studies indicated that exposure to realistic and intense human life or death scenarios successfully provided thousands of medics with critical thinking and life-saving skills, confidence and the ability to put learned theories to use before exposure to real life situations. We intend to do the same at Oldham County EMS.