8:15am—10:00am KEYNOTE PRESENTATION
Teamwork in Emergency Services
Presented by Jon PolitisCEU: 1.5 Other

When a life is saved it’s rare that any one person really “saved the day”. More often than not it’s a series of people working together as a team who really made it happen. In EMS all too often we emphasize individual performance beyond the effectiveness of teamwork. It’s a serious problem in our organizations and at personal and professional levels in EMS. This presentation is a thought provoking look at the importance of teamwork and what it means to EMS.

Presented through the auspices of the National Academy of Tactical Medical Response (NATMR), this course covers the basics of tactical medicine operations. This program is considered a foundational course that will serve as a basis for future training of the tactical medic. Team development and basic medical aspects of tactical operations are presented. Assessment, treatment and evacuation of injured personnel are stressed in this two-day program. Hands-on training supplements the scheduled lectures and provides a challenge to all program participants. Class size is limited to 18 students. Tuition is set by the Academy and covers specialized equipment and supplies that are provided for the practical sessions. Tuition is $295.00. This is a two day program and students must attend both days. This course is intensive. You will alternate between indoor and outdoor activities during the course.

Children with breathing problems are a common medical emergency. Respiratory compromise is a leading cause of death and disability in pediatric patients with major trauma. EMS providers can greatly improve outcome by learning to recognize and treat pediatric respiratory problems promptly before they worsen into cardiopulmonary failure or arrest.

Crisis events and potential crises happen every day in the United States. EMS vehicles crash, patients get dropped, patients complain, personnel act up. How an agency and its staff respond to those crises can set the stage for a successful recovery, or can turn a predictable crisis in to a career-ending event. This session will provide a framework for EMS officers to plan, train, and otherwise prepare for the unhappy events that will inevitably occur.

How many times have we been burned on the “Routine Transport”? There have been times that even the most mundane of calls has gone south quickly. No one has complete control over what is going to happen. The thought of this becoming a mistake, a major incident or worse yet a lawsuit can be intimidating. The purpose of this presentation is to show the EMS provider how, using Standard Operating Procedures, common sense and concise documentation can stack the deck in your favor if an incident ends up in the courtroom. Learn how documentation can make or break cases being litigated, and the simple things you can do to keep yourself out of lawsuits.

Drs. Rittenberger and Guyette will explore pitfalls in emergency patient care as it relates to vital signs. Join them as they present interesting cases, discuss common abnormalities and review some of the literature for each vital sign we use every day.

Anyone can be on the receiving end of domestic violence and not all episodes are physical in nature. Domestic violence leaves “bruises on the inside too.” How to recognize domestic violence at a scene or in one of your co-workers. Would you know what was happening?

Discussion of the kinematics, mechanism of injury, injury severity and outcomes of AGH Trauma experience of tree stand falls.

Basic Life Support is the foundation for prehospital care. This presentation will update EMS providers on current research in EMS and how it relates to prehospital care in the field. The focus is on information you can use in the care of the patient.

Follow Dr. Paris as he reviews shock, revealing an insightful and detailed assessment as well as simple management tools.

This class is setup to be a open discussion hands on class. Students will be given scenarios of what it was like to do patient care in the early days of racing. We will go through old videos, equipment, and treatment of early racing incidents. The class will progress into modern day racing treatments. The plan is to show the students some of the ideas for the future of EMS in motorsports.

One of the best experiences any EMS provider can have is to see EMS through the patient’s eyes. Good clinical care is a lot more than the effective delivery of technology; it’s the way we care for people in times of crisis! An important outcome is the way our patients feel after we have treated them. Have you ever considered how what we do looks to others? Using numerous patient contacts through the eyes of a patient, the essentials of customer will be presented.

Collisions involving emergency vehicles have been a constant and even growing concern and intersection collisions are the most serious of these incidents. This is a targeted initiative to bring a heightened awareness of intersection safety to emergency services and ultimately reduce the frequency and severity of intersection losses. This program will provide best practices for the way Emergency Service Organizations (ESO) should approach intersections during emergency response and privately owned vehicle (POV) response.

Join the Director of the PA Department of Health Bureau of EMS as he reviews the new EMS Act and the proposed rules and regulations. You’ll be among the first in Pennsylvania to comment on how EMS will function for the next several years.

Life in the emergency services field involves stress at every turn, whether it is the injured patient or your supervisor. Unfortunately, providers often “take the job home” and the job affects ones health, family, and friends. This presentation will look at types of stress, coping mechanisms, and what happens when coping mechanisms fail. Suggestions will be provided to help anyone who attends this session.

An interactive lecture that will include audience participation and discussion of pediatric trauma assessment, management and recovery.

This interactive session will review the general respiratory and cardiac systems. This instructor-led session will allow for dissection of the respiratory and cardiac systems of an adult sized pig. Participants will work in teams for the hands on portion. This will be a great learning experience for both new and seasoned practitioners. There is an additional lab fee of $30 and class size limit of 20 participants (ALS preferred).

Most EMS training teaches us how to deal with the average patient. Due to advances in medical technology and more plentiful support services, children who have suffered critical injuries and those with unique disease states are being cared for at home more than ever. This presentation will explain the most common equipment and technology that prehospital providers will encounter when caring for these patients.

The National EMS Workforce Project has identified the lack of career opportunity as one of the major issues facing EMS organizations. As we attempt to replace a workforce of 80 million people (the “baby boom” generation) with a workforce of 30 million people, there will be intense competition for quality workers. This session will discuss the challenges that face EMS leaders as the strive to build an environment where career EMS staff have more to look forward to than “the back of the truck” and the “front of the truck.”

Geared specifically for EMS managers, this session, led by the Director of the PA Department of Health Bureau of EMS, will review the new EMS Act and the proposed rules and regulations. New definitions, new types of providers and new ways of running EMS will be covered in this session that will impact you!

From a cardiac arrest at the dialysis center to a hallucinating alcoholic to a seizing bulimic, Jennifer Russell presents cases of the myriad medical emergencies caused by metabolic imbalances. A review of body systems and functions including endocrine, hepatic, acid/base, and renal is covered. There are an assortment of factors that can cause metabolic disturbances, through case presentations, specific assessment and treatment techniques to manage these complicated patients will be provided.

Throughout the emergency services sector the issue of rehabilitation is often overlooked or the burden is placed onto auxiliary members. Other than life safety, and property protection this is undoubtedly the most important aspect of any major incident. During any fire operation, rehabilitation of firefighters is always a consideration, but very seldom is it ever given serious consideration. Roughly 100 firefighters die and 50,000 – 100,000 are injured in the line of duty in the United States each year. Even though fire suppression constitutes less than 5% of the national fire service emergency call volume, one-third of the line-of-duty deaths and half of the injuries occur on the fire ground.

Critically injured patients who are entrapped are some of the most difficult to care for: the ABC’s, temperature control, analgesia, sedation, extrication... The essence of prehospital care is the treatment of patients in these circumstances, but many providers today understand very little about this type of rescue medicine. This presentation is an in depth look at caring for patients who are entrapped and essentials of packaging and removal.