SFD News and Information: SPOKANE FIRE DEPARTMENT RECOGNIZES NATIONAL EMS WEEK WITH A SPECIAL MEETING

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SPOKANE FIRE DEPARTMENT RECOGNIZES NATIONAL EMS WEEK WITH A SPECIAL MEETING

TWO SPOKANE FIRE DEPARTMENT FIREFIGHTERS MEET RECOVERING PATIENT AND HIS FAMILY

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This year to help recognize National Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Week, Fire Chief Bobby Williams and Mike Lopez (Integrated Medical Services Manager) helped to arrange a special meeting for two Spokane Fire Department firefighters—Nate Denison (Firefighter/Paramedic) and Andrew Polomis (Firefighter).

The meeting allowed Denison and Polomis to reconnect with a recovering patient they had helped during the Bloomsday Race.

“As frontline emergency medical responders, we do not often have the opportunity to see the people we help as they are recovering,” advises Chief Willliams. “This is why I felt it was important that we facilitated this special reunion. The exceptional collaboration by the entire medical team for this emergency should be commended.”

The goal of the Spokane Fire Department is to provide patients with care that is as close as possible to the care a patient would receive in an emergency room.

During the visit, the patient’s family (who wish to remain anonymous for privacy reasons) said the following:

“Our families are enormously grateful to the Spokane EMS community for saving our son after he collapsed at the Bloomsday Race finish line earlier this month. The EMS team noticed that our son was struggling as he crossed the line, guided him into a wheelchair, and rolled him to the medical tent. The team resuscitated him and packed him off to Sacred Heart Hospital, where he has made a strong recovery.”

Family members also said that in light of National EMS Week, they would like to pass on a couple of suggestions that reflect what they learned from this experience:

· Have your family learn CPR. My wife took our family to a course a few years ago. The American Red Cross and other organization offer the course. Now I would like my family to take a refresher course. I would love to pay this forward.

· Enable the Medical Identification (ID) on your smartphone. On the iPhone, this ID contains key medical information and can be accessed from the locked screen (https://support.apple.com/en-us/). Android offers a similar Medical ID app.

· Hug your local EMS members during EMS week. They all deserve it.

Denison and Polomis were part of a highly effective team of medical professionals assigned to the Finish Line Aid Station at the Bloomsday Race. They were a dedicated resource if resuscitation was needed.

“While every EMS incident in Spokane involves a team of dedicated prehospital health professionals, special events like Bloomsday require additional team members from the local healthcare system. In this case, in addition to the key role played by Paramedic Denison and EMT Polomis, others from American Medical Response and the Providence Health System worked together to provide life-saving care. We want to recognize the efforts of everyone involved in this case. It truly demonstrates the importance, and benefit, of collaboration between the various health care teams in the community,” says Lopez.

In 2015, the Spokane Fire Department responded to 33,881 emergency calls, representing 86 percent of all the incidents the department responds to. For more information about the Department’s Emergency Medical Services visit https://my.spokanecity.org/fire/operations/ems/.

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