Audio file
THIT406 Chris Desborough Final2.mp3
Transcript
00:00:00 Speaker 1
Thank you, Chris, for joining us today.
00:00:03 Speaker 1
On the talking health and the four Oh six podcast, I think we'll go ahead and start out, if you don't mind. Just I would love to hear a little bit about your background and what brought you to talking to us today.
00:00:16 Speaker 2
Originally from Wales back in the UK and most of my life has been spent either in aerospace and microchips and back to aerospace.
00:00:25 Speaker 2
Lived all over the US and finally retired from Utah and moved up to Montana.
00:00:34 Speaker 2
The main reason I got into the EMT field was when I look back at my life and I've been writing this book that I've never actually finished with about twenty different near death experiences or some really crazy experiences I've had.
00:00:50 Speaker 2
Whether it's been flying hang gliders, flying planes, I used to work with explosives many years ago.
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And I've been in several ambulances in my life.
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And I thought, you know.
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The number of times I've been in an ambulance now I'm retired. Maybe it's time to be in that ambulance on the other side, helping somebody else who needs it.
00:01:11 Speaker 2
So basically that's how I got into the EMT field. I think the final.
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Straw was July of twenty twenty three when I was riding my motorcycle up to Livingston.
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And there were several people behind me we were doing. I think I had cruise control set at like Sixty mile an hour on the motorcycle, half a dozen vehicles behind me. And somebody way at the back overtook them. I believe being chased by a sheriff.
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At close on a hundred mile an hour and that vehicle ran into the back of me.
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While I was on the motorcycle.
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And my motorcycle went partially underneath the.
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I was still underneath the motorcycle and according to the final sheriff's report, that vehicle actually dragged me two hundred and seventy four feet.
00:02:02 Speaker 2
So almost the length of the football field at a hundred mile an hour now, and I'm still here. I'm glad to say.
00:02:10 Speaker 1
Well, we're glad you're still here.
00:02:13 Speaker 2
So interestingly, two of the vehicles that were behind me at the time, I did not know the gentleman, but two of them actually turned out to be firefighters from the Paradise Valley Fire Station, which is the fire station that I eventually joined after I was going through.
00:02:29 Speaker 2
Physical therapy and recovery.
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So that's how I got into the EMT world.
00:02:34 Speaker 1
Yeah. Thanks.
00:02:35 Speaker 1
Let's let's go back to that crash.
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Do you have?
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Any memory of what was going through your mind when that car hit you from behind?
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The first couple of seconds I didn't even see the car coming.
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The first couple of seconds with the speed that he hit me from behind.
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Things just went kind of grey and black, and then the next thing I realized was I was underneath my.
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Or just being dragged up the road. So it was.
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It was several seconds into the incident while that crash that I knew something was not right and I couldn't for the life of me figure out what the issue was.
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And it.
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It took several seconds until I realized that I was literally attached underneath underneath my motorcycle and to the side of a vehicle.
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So the first several seconds was just a total mystery.
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Was I I don't know how to explain.
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It was just everything went black for a couple of seconds and then the next thing I know is I'm on the road and I can. I'm face down on the road under the bike.
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Go go in at quite a rate of speed up the road trying to figure out what's going on.
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Let's talk a little.
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Bit about you know what you were wearing and you know.
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What did your safety equipment look like and how do you think that contributed to possibly reducing your and allowing you to still be with us today?
00:04:01 Speaker 2
Thank.
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Give me a chance to get on my soapbox now because.
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I've ridden.
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I'm probably sixty nine in a couple of.
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I've I've ridden motorcycles since I was fifteen and I've always worn a helmet.
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And when you look at the percentage of people in the US about, I think it's about forty one percent of motorcycle accidents.
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That result in a death was due to a person not wearing a motorcycle helmet, and I just.
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I just wish people would would really get on board and put a helmet on. I I tell people many times.
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You.
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You can live without an arm and a.
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It's unfortunate and it's awkward, but it's kind of hard to live without your head, you know?
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So protect it.
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That day I had probably one of the best motorcycle helmets you can buy is full full face one.
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Very expensive one, but again, I'm here today because.
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I did have a really good motorcycle jacket.
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It was a summer jacket, a mesh one, so the air flows through it, but inside the arms and all the way down the back and the lower back is protected by.
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Nylon, basically hard nylon pads.
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So even though the jacket was shredded.
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I had very little damage to my upper body.
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I had a lot of scarring on my right leg.
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I had basically.
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Pair of.
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Genes on and motorcycle boots, but other than that, it was definitely the jacket and the motorcycle helmet.
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I'm absolutely convinced. Saved my life, without a doubt.
00:05:49 Speaker 1
So after the crash, what happens? You know, what did it look like the response and and getting you to care?
00:05:56 Speaker 2
The first thing when I was laying face down on the ground and I could hear people.
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Tolkien and I thought, oh, OK, cool.
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I think I'm still alive because people around me are talking and as things became a bit clearer, I asked people.
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I said can you lift the bike off me? Because I knew something was wrong with my right foot.
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And I asked the people that were stood there said can you get the motorcycle off me please?
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And which they didn't want to do until the.
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'S got there.
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But I finally convinced them.
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They.
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They lifted it off me.
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Can't say enough about Livingston Fire Rescue team?
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They were the ones on scene.
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I remember one gentle moment taking his cowboy hat off and he was holding it to protect my face from the sun because he was a bright, sunny day that day. And I did tell them, I said.
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I'm checking my spine, my upper spine and I said everything feels OK.
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Let's go ahead and take the helmet off, which is sometimes what you don't do in a motorcycle accident. But I could tell that move my head around gently.
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I didn't think there was anything wrong and the helmet I had had a special release for taking the helmet off and he would leave an inner liner on your head as well.
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Which we eventually took off as well.
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The thing that really stood out, and I think again one of the things that really made me say I want to be an EMT now. I'm retired and I want to help other people, and I've mentioned this to many people.
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Was a young lady stood in the middle of the road.
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And she was just mortified.
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And.
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She couldn't do anything.
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She stood.
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Other people were trying to help before Livingston Fire Rescue got there and she was just stood in the middle of the road with her hands up to her face and there was nothing she could do.
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And I I just felt.
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I felt sorry for her as opposed to myself laying on the floor, beating up pretty badly and underneath that motorcycle and I thought I just never want to be in that situation where I can't help somebody else.
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So I think that was really the final straw. When I said, you know what, I've got the time now.
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I'm going to be coming and do what I can to help other people.
00:08:20 Speaker 1
I assume you were eventually transported by ambulance to a care facility which would start. Maybe your path to, you know, having your injuries addressed.
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Was the extent of your injuries once you were seen by medical providers?
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Yeah, Livingston fire.
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They're the ones that picked me up off the road, put me in the ambulance, took me to Livingston Healthcare.
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They gave me a whole bunch of nice pain meds on the.
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So which was extremely useful. I was in some agony there, so it turned out my left hand, the metacarpal was broken all.
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Of course.
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And then my right foot.
00:09:02 Speaker 2
We had two things wrong there, so it broke the metatarsals in the right foot. But when I was in the hospital, I said to a few people, I said there's something else wrong with my right foot. And they said, well, yeah, we X-rayed it. You got broken.
00:09:18 Speaker 2
And then it was about.
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Ten, twelve weeks later, I was going through physical therapy. Occupational.
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I beg your pardon for the left hand and the young lady doing the occupational therapy said I'm not a foot person.
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Any chance I can take a look at your foot and I still had a medical boot on at the time, I said sure.
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So we unwrapped it.
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She looked.
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It and she says, Chris, you need to.
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To the wound clinic right now.
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And so I.
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I called the Wound Clinic in Bozeman.
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And I talked.
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To a lady who had actually fixed, I had a spinal operation about three, four years ago, which went wrong.
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It broke open and it got a little bit septic, so they ended up putting in a pit line.
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I had to inject antibiotics every night for about six weeks.
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Well, the lady recognized my voice and said.
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Chris, just how you doing?
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Your.
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I said spine is great, I said I got another problem now though.
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And she said, what's that?
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Said. Well, my foot.
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I said I'm doing occupational therapy and they just looked at my foot and they said.
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We think you need to.
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To the wound.
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So what does it look?
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As well as green and yellow and red and and she said, come in right away.
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So I went into the wound clinic and they said Yep, two more weeks, we're probably going to cut your foot off.
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So they did an abbreviated on that put a wound back on it for two weeks and did an absolutely fantastic job and saved the foot.
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So that was really appreciative of that.
00:10:50 Speaker 2
I was in the hospital for three days. First off, when I got into the emergency room, it was a matter of taking a look at all the injuries a lot of road rash on the right leg, a little bit on the elbows, on the on the left knee.
00:11:04 Speaker 2
But the main thing as I mentioned, was the broken metacarpal in the left hand, broken metatarsals in the right foot.
00:11:11 Speaker 2
I was there for a total of six days.
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Before they let me go home and that's that's then when the occupational therapy began about.
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About ten or twelve weeks later, which was unfortunate because my left hand, even though I can use it, I cannot completely straighten my fingers like the right hand and every fifteen twenty minutes everyday I have to.
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Bend them and get them working.
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Otherwise they end up seizing in one position.
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But one of the doctors said we could operate, but there's no guarantee that it would fix anything.
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And at that point, I think I was.
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I didn't want to be cut open anymore and tweaked on, so I figured I would live with this and just keep on exercising it.
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Multiple times a day.
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For for however long it takes.
00:12:03 Speaker 1
Yeah. And. And you're no stranger to injury.
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You've you've been involved in a couple of other fun incidents with brushes with.
00:12:11
Yes, yes.
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Death.
00:12:13 Speaker 2
Yeah, I have, yeah.
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So I tell people I did actually suffer death, but I got better back in, which is a old Monty Python statement for anyone that remembers Monty Python show when we lived in Spokane.
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In twenty ten.
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I ended up with going to cardiac arrest in the heart.
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And lo and behold, my wife actually gave me CPR. I didn't even know that she knew CPR, and when I came around six days later in the hospital, I asked when she told me what happened.
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Like, when did you know CPR?
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When she said, oh, when I was in the Navy back in.
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Late seventies. I'm like, wow.
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And she'd never used it until then.
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But yeah, so I had had cardiac arrest. The local fire station was only like three streets away.
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So my wife gave me CPR. Fire Station turned up.
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Couldn't get me going. Hit me with.
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Rules eventually got me down to Spokane Sacred Heart.
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Great place to be. And I tell people they basically froze me for four.
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So they put you in one of those cooling suits where they induce a coma and then on day five, I think it was they put ad fib pacemaker in.
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And I woke up the following day on on day six, wondering where the heck I was and what was going on.
00:13:40 Speaker 1
You've had some other crash type incidents too. Didn't didn't you have a Hang Gliding incident or something?
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Not much.
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I did.
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A paragliding.
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I flew green lighters for fifteen years.
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Several years in Europe, when my wife and I lived over there and then we moved to California.
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So I had three Hang Gliding accidents.
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The worst one, I think.
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Actually, the second one was where I hit the ground when I was coming into land and I got hit by a dust devil, which is like a mini tornado that basically pulled me out of the air.
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I was about a hundred and fifty feet above the ground coming into.
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And and this dust devil just whipped me out of the sky.
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I went face down into the into the desert and I'm laying there and gently moving my head and my shoulders and I can see the other guys who'd already landed running towards me.
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And I'm just checking out my body, moving it slowly and I got down to my leg and I thought, oh, my left leg feels funny. And when they lifted the hang glider up because it's above you, when they lifted it up, I looked down and my knee was.
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Out of my leg.
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So anyway, they got me off to hospital and.
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One of the doctors actually got up and stitched them all back together.
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But the.
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One, I think which didn't result in an injury. A friend of mine and I, we both had hang gliders and we were in San Bernardino, California, and we wanted to fly across this big valley to another another city.
00:15:07 Speaker 2
And we caught the thermals and we got up to eleven and a half thousand feet and a lot of people don't realize that with hang gliders, you can you can get up to extreme heights. When I flew up in what they call the Owens Valley, Central California, we.
00:15:23 Speaker 2
Regularly get to eighteen thousand feet, which was really.
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Pretty cool. But anyway, we were flying across this valley and we were eleven and a half thousand feet and all of a sudden and my buddy he's like a quarter of a mile out on my left and we carried radios in our harnesses and small oxygen tanks and.
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Like that.
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And all of a sudden I started dropping out of the air, just like a rock, and my buddy gets on the radio, he says.
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You.
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There's we'll never get across the valley, he said.
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You start losing out.
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And I said to him, said Andy.
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Said I'm not doing.
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I said I'm stuck in some kind of downdraft.
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Would you even hear about airliners when they drop five thousand feet and stuff like that?
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Happens.
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And this is what I was.
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I was actually in a major cold air downdraft and I literally dropped from eleven thousand five hundred feet.
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Literally ten, nine, eight, seven and I was trying everything I could to get out of this downdraft and I could not get out of it. And I went through one thousand feet.
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And literally then, as I was going down through nine hundred, eight hundred seven hundred.
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When I got to two hundred feet, I closed my eyes because at that point I might.
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I'm going to die.
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And the next thing I know is my entire body is being sandblasted.
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And I'm like, what on Earth am I dead?
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What's going on?
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And literally so I opened my eyes.
00:16:53 Speaker 2
Well, one of the things flying in San Bernardino because of the smog there, we used to fly with ski goggles on.
00:16:59 Speaker 2
So you didn't end up with the bright red eyes at the end of the day flying in?
00:17:03 Speaker 2
Smog well, I opened my eyes and my ski goggles, my face, my body. There's just sand and pebbles.
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Just beaten the heck out of me and I'm like, am I dead?
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What's going on?
00:17:17 Speaker 2
And I pulled the bar back on my hand glider, which basically moves your hand glider forward.
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And after about twenty or thirty seconds, I broke out into clear blue skies and I was literally about fifty feet above the floor.
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I landed the glider and I looked back.
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And literally you could see the cold air down draft hitting the desert and as it hit the desert it then literally bounced off the desert floor and went through all of the grit and gravel and everything on the desert back up into the air.
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And that was the only thing that saved me from hitting the desert floor was literally the air hitting the desert and bouncing back.
00:17:54 Speaker 2
Yep. So that was in hang Light, noted the three accidents I had. That was the only one where I thought I am going to die.
00:18:05 Speaker 2
And thankfully, yet again, I did not.
00:18:08 Speaker 1
Well, you must have nine lives.
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And then I'm actually a pilot as.
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It all was until I got my pacemaker and I had three incidents flying a plane as well.
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Twice I lost it, lost the engine, and once I actually had a cockpit fire as well it's been.
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Been a good life.
00:18:27 Speaker 1
When you think back about all of these incidents.
00:18:30 Speaker 1
Is your emotional reaction to the motorcycle crash.
00:18:34 Speaker 1
You know, do you have any feelings toward the driver of the car?
00:18:40
Yes.
00:18:43 Speaker 2
Maybe I I can understand an accident or a crash happening.
00:18:47 Speaker 2
But this could have been avoided.
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I can't remember what the alcohol level was on this person.
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Was an insane amount.
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And it that's sad.
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That we see that all too often, especially being an EMT now as well.
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People that have been drinking, causing accidents. So to me that was very disappointing. So and at the same time as well.
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It's ruined this, this young guy 's life as well.
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He's currently in jail right now instead of being out in the workforce, you know, assisting society and getting a family and all the rest of it.
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I I feel for him as well.
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I don't hold any grudges.
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I wish it had never happened because it ruined my life for quite some time, but at the same time it's ruined his as well and it's it's unnecessary.
00:19:42 Speaker 1
You know you.
00:19:42 Speaker 1
Said you still have some problems with your hand.
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You know, you're you're almost.
00:19:47 Speaker 1
This was two years ago.
00:19:49 Speaker 2
July the fifth. Twenty twenty three.
00:19:51 Speaker 1
Do.
00:19:52 Speaker 1
Do you foresee like have?
00:19:54 Speaker 1
Are you still able to ride motorcycles or do some of the other stuff, or are you working toward that? Maybe for this summer?
00:20:00 Speaker 1
Do you think that you will you ever ride motorcycles again?
00:20:03 Speaker 2
Have no problem writing a motorcycle. However, I did actually have two motorcycles.
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Of course, the one that was in the incident was completely written off.
00:20:13 Speaker 2
And then a few months ago, I thought, you know what, when we start up the other motorcycle in the garage and maybe take it for a quick ride, I went out there, but I couldn't pull the clutch in because of I can't pull my hand far enough back.
00:20:28 Speaker 2
Like I can with the right hand.
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I cannot pull the clutch all the way in, so I ended up selling that.
00:20:34 Speaker 2
I put it on Facebook and sold it within a few days, so again, I've got nothing riding about. You know, I've got no issues riding motor.
00:20:42 Speaker 2
Cycle.
00:20:43 Speaker 2
I just don't don't know if I'll ever be able to. If I can get enough flexibility in that left hand.
00:20:48 Speaker 2
So that's disappointing, again. Certainly the accident did not put me off riding motorcycles.
00:20:53 Speaker 1
You're such a positive attitude, really, considering the circumstances around this crash.
00:20:58 Speaker 1
Is there any advice that you would give to someone who may be in a similar?
00:21:03 Speaker 1
I mean, you've had a pretty long road of recovery, you know, almost a week in the hospital, several weeks of.
00:21:09 Speaker 1
Of therapy. Plus, I mean you and your injuries, considering the significance of the crash where you know more minimal than they could have been for sure.
00:21:18 Speaker 1
You know, and then the foot problem, what?
00:21:20 Speaker 1
What would you tell other people who may not have as much experience or ability to look at this through such a positive lens?
00:21:29 Speaker 1
To get to a point of recovery after something like this.
00:21:32 Speaker 2
The biggest thing, again, like I said earlier on, get me on my soapbox about wearing a helmet and a jacket and gloves. The right motorcycle gear, and even when you wear all the right gear, it's still a risk.
00:21:46 Speaker 2
It's it's that's a given. People in in automobiles are wrapped around with steel on a motorcycle.
00:21:53 Speaker 2
You and the elements out there.
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And yes, there's a lot of fun to ride in a.
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But.
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Least do the most you can for yourself to protect yourself.
00:22:02 Speaker 2
The majority and I googled this actually a few months ago. The majority of the world, the countries in the world, people ride motorcycles with helmets and I don't understand why here in the US, why a lot of people feel they just don't need to wear one. It's not.
00:22:21 Speaker 2
So protect yourself.
00:22:24 Speaker 2
At least do that.
00:22:25 Speaker 1
Well, I thank you for reiterating our.
00:22:28 Speaker 1
We try to get that message out as well, of course.
00:22:32 Speaker 1
You know, helmets and seatbelts.
00:22:34 Speaker 1
Save lives.
00:22:35 Speaker 2
Absolutely.
00:22:37 Speaker 1
So I'd I'd like to shift a little bit to the to the EMT side.
00:22:41 Speaker 1
You know, since you become an EMT, we also have Sherry Graham, who's our EMS manager for the state of Montana here with us today.
00:22:48 Speaker 1
Let's talk about what is the impact to the EM, TS or Chris if you've had a situation since your crash of responding to a crash like this when you come upon the scene of a crash where someone you know, especially on a motorcycle.
00:23:05 Speaker 1
They're so vulnerable and exposed. What goes through your mind?
00:23:08 Speaker 1
Are the steps you.
00:23:09 Speaker 1
What are the things you think about when you respond to a crash like this?
00:23:13 Speaker 2
Fortunately, I've not seen a motorcycle crash other than my own.
00:23:18 Speaker 2
Since I've been become an EMT, I did wrap up the end of twenty twenty four.
00:23:24 Speaker 2
Were a hundred and sixty two calls myself in in Paradise Valley.
00:23:28 Speaker 2
So that was pretty cool. I got to learn a lot from a lot of the people I work with.
00:23:33 Speaker 2
With and when, like Livingston, Fire Rescue turns up on the scene as well, they get to learn from them.
00:23:40 Speaker 2
So I've been on a lot of calls in the valley here because of all the wildlife we have down in Paradise Valley on the way to Gardner. We have had multiple, as you can imagine.
00:23:52 Speaker 2
What I call SUV versus elk or SUV versus deer calls this year?
00:23:58 Speaker 2
Most of them.
00:23:59 Speaker 2
Have turned out pretty good with the.
00:24:03 Speaker 2
Taking the majority of the damage we have had a few people that have been injured.
00:24:09 Speaker 2
So my first thought when I turn up on them is what is the most I can do for this person until somebody like Livingston Fire Rescue gets there?
00:24:19 Speaker 2
So it's mostly do we need to extricate them from the vehicle?
00:24:25 Speaker 2
What do we need to do to protect them?
00:24:26 Speaker 2
You know, is it spinal restriction?
00:24:30 Speaker 2
How do we get them?
00:24:31 Speaker 2
Of the vehicle.
00:24:33 Speaker 2
And what's the first things I need to look at? Is there any haemorrhaging going on?
00:24:39 Speaker 2
What are the life saving tasks that we need to perform immediately for these folks?
00:24:47 Speaker 2
And again, like I said, most of the vehicle.
00:24:51 Speaker 2
Deer versus vehicle instance we've had have worked out pretty well and we've only had a handful of real injuries this year down in the valley.
00:25:01 Speaker 2
But again, it's the same for any call is. What is the initial.
00:25:05 Speaker 2
Life life threat for this person and what do I need to do to put them in the most comfortable position I can before we start looking at them even further to try in a system?
00:25:18 Speaker 1
Thank you.
00:25:19 Speaker 1
Yeah. Sherry, do you have anything to add or have you ever?
00:25:22 Speaker 1
To.
00:25:22 Speaker 1
Specifically, a motorcycle crash and how that might be different than an automobile crash.
00:25:28 Speaker 3
Yeah, I would say, you know, especially with a motorcycle crash.
00:25:34 Speaker 3
You know it's going through your head on the way there is is hoping and praying that they had a helmet on and protective gear because it's certainly lessons. Lessons what we have to do on scene as as Chris stated, you know, once you arrive on scene just.
00:25:51 Speaker 3
Making sure that that your AB, Cs are taken care of.
00:25:55 Speaker 3
Making sure that a immediate life threats are handled and you know, thinking about where you're at and what are the resources you might need.
00:26:05 Speaker 3
To get that person where they need to be dependent on injuries, you know, do they need to be at the the local critical access hospital or do they need?
00:26:14 Speaker 3
Need a helicopter to fly them to a a bigger tertiary care center trauma center to care for their injuries.
00:26:23 Speaker 3
Lots of thoughts, uh.
00:26:26 Speaker 3
And and again just saying a little prayer on the way there that they've got a helmet on because it, you know, makes all the difference in the world to what we find when we arrive on scene.
00:26:36 Speaker 1
And chair you mentioned the AB CS just for our general listener.
00:26:39 Speaker 1
You explain what that means.
00:26:41 Speaker 3
Airway, breathing and circulation.
00:26:43 Speaker 3
Just making sure that they have a patent airway that they're.
00:26:46 Speaker 3
To breathe.
00:26:48 Speaker 3
That they are breathing adequately and that there's no.
00:26:53 Speaker 3
There's no major blood loss anywhere that you need to.
00:26:56 Speaker 3
You're just looking at those things first and then moving on to trying to stabilize other treatments.
00:27:01 Speaker 3
Please.
00:27:02 Speaker 1
Sherry, I'd like to ask.
00:27:05 Speaker 1
I know you've been in the EMS field for a long time.
00:27:08 Speaker 1
How often have you encountered crashes involving impaired driving, and how does this impact severity of injuries to those either?
00:27:18 Speaker 1
You know the the driver themselves or folks involved in other vehicles?
00:27:24 Speaker 3
The data in front of me to tell you how often impaired drivers are involved in motor vehicle crashes, but I would I would have to say that the the majority of.
00:27:35 Speaker 3
Motor vehicle crashes that we respond to outside of near the end, the ones that involve animals, usually those. Those are a crap shoot. But but the actual, you know, run off the road or or, you know, hitting another driver.
00:27:51 Speaker 3
I'd say the majority of them have impaired either impaired or distracted. You know, I think distracted driving is right up there with the impaired driving. As far as the the number of incidents that we respond to unfortunately.
00:28:05 Speaker 3
It's it's not easy to quantify that as far as research goes, because people aren't going to tell you that they were on their cell phone when they hit somebody head on.
00:28:15 Speaker 3
But you know, there's work being done to try and get a better understanding of how often that happens.
00:28:23 Speaker 3
Because we certainly see it.
00:28:25 Speaker 3
In fact, in many of the the calls that I can think of.
00:28:30 Speaker 3
Over the years.
00:28:33 Speaker 3
Especially in the last fifteen years, involve distracted driving and use of cell phones and such when they're driving.
00:28:41 Speaker 3
As well as impaired, whether it be drugs or alcohol.
00:28:46 Speaker 1
So Sherry, as far as protecting our EMS providers as well as other folks on the road, other first responders, tow truck drivers is our move over law.
00:28:54 Speaker 1
I know that's been very high profile in the state the last few years. We've had some tragedies of first responders and tow truck drivers who have been struck by drivers.
00:29:04 Speaker 1
You talk a little bit about the move over Montana law and what that means to first responders.
00:29:09 Speaker 3
Yeah, every time we respond to a an incident on a highway, we're putting our lives at risk, you know? And it really comes back to the distracted driving and impaired driving and how important it is to not be distracted or impaired behind the wheel.
00:29:28 Speaker 3
If you come onto an accident scene, it's it's imperative that you slow down and you move over and give the responders room to work.
00:29:38 Speaker 3
If you're in pain, you run a higher risk.
00:29:44 Speaker 3
Injuring those folks on scene.
00:29:48 Speaker 3
I've been involved in EMS response, some going on forty years, and I've been on three scenes where we have had people come into the scene and actually hit vehicles.
00:30:03 Speaker 3
Thank goodness nobody was injured in any of those three incidents, but it certainly could have happened and we just always ask people to please protect our responders and it's.
00:30:13 Speaker 3
Maybe not only the EMS providers, it's the fire service providers.
00:30:17 Speaker 3
The tow truck drivers.
00:30:19 Speaker 3
It's the Department of Transportation.
00:30:21 Speaker 3
Law enforcement.
00:30:22 Speaker 3
It's the whole team that's out there trying to work. Those highway scenes. Need your.
00:30:29 Speaker 3
The diligence of the public when they're driving to slow down and move over and and protect us while we're trying to care for you.
00:30:36 Speaker 1
Yeah. And I know.
00:30:37 Speaker 1
Especially law enforcement has done a lot of training around the state to try to make sure they're improving. Scene management a couple of years ago, my family and I were travelling over the holidays and we were on the Bozeman Pass and we.
00:30:51 Speaker 1
Were coming up a hill.
00:30:52 Speaker 1
We hit a patch of black ice and luckily my husband was paying attention and he was able to recover in a slight skid.
00:31:00 Speaker 1
We popped up over on the top of the hill.
00:31:03 Speaker 1
And there was vehicles off the road on both.
00:31:06 Speaker 1
There was emergency, you know, first responders and law enforcement. And you know, if he hadn't been paying attention, we easily could have gone off the road and crashed, right?
00:31:18 Speaker 1
Into highway patrolman that was parked right off the side of the.
00:31:20 Speaker 1
But you know, so they're they're doing a lot of education about, let's get some signs out or flares or park a vehicle so that people know there's an incident coming up.
00:31:28 Speaker 1
I do think you know they can't always do.
00:31:31 Speaker 1
Or you might be coming up on a very fresh crash scene where they haven't had a chance to really secure the scene yet, and it's just very important that everyone is paying attention.
00:31:41 Speaker 1
And and ensuring that you're in control of your vehicle and you're aware of your surroundings.
00:31:46 Speaker 1
You for sharing that Sherry.
00:31:49 Speaker 1
I'd also love to know, you know, when you think about EMS agents, I think most of us think of them as, you know, the people on the scene.
00:31:57 Speaker 1
I think a lot of the folks in our EMS communities do a lot of work outside of just responding to emergency.
00:32:02 Speaker 1
A lot of to do education around how people can make safer choices, whether it's driving or anything other kinds of injury related incidents that they respond to.
00:32:14 Speaker 1
Is there important messaging you want to get out there or are there things you know that EMS community in the state of Montana are doing to really help?
00:32:22 Speaker 1
People be safer and to make good choices, especially when they're out on the road.
00:32:27 Speaker 3
You know, one of the the programs that really stands out is the distracted driving education that some of the EMS agencies will do a little course with a golf cart and specific goggles and such that mimic impaired driving. And they'll take that to the high schools and.
00:32:47 Speaker 3
Make that available so that that one I think is really impactful. And then I think another thing is to setting being good role models, you know.
00:32:58 Speaker 3
Being that person that that has zero tolerance for getting behind the wheel when you're impaired or using your cell phone and and just being a good role model for your kids and for other people in the community, I think it's is very impactful.
00:33:12 Speaker 1
Thanks.
00:33:13 Speaker 1
Do you have anything to add to that?
00:33:15
Yeah, one.
00:33:15 Speaker 2
Of the things that being a former engineer, I have to have charts and graphs as engineers. Do you know? So I collected all of the data from our fire station for last year.
00:33:28 Speaker 2
And put it into an Excel spreadsheet, bar charts and pie charts and so on, showing the amount of calls we had.
00:33:38 Speaker 2
What the call types were and things like that and then caused by month and then I noticed. Then I highlighted what our top three calls for the year were. So for example, number one for EMT was chest pain.
00:33:53 Speaker 2
Followed by number two, which was trips and falls and breaks. And when I started looking at the data I was trying to figure out OK.
00:34:04 Speaker 2
There any correlation on the chest pain as I.
00:34:06 Speaker 2
Year didn't really see anything.
00:34:09 Speaker 2
It's hit or miss. One of the things I noticed though, when I put all the data together for trips and falls that over ninety percent of the trips and falls that we went on.
00:34:21 Speaker 2
Were people that were typically in the seventy five to ninety year age range and probably not surprising.
00:34:32 Speaker 2
So one of the things I did was, and I can't remember the ladies last name. She was at one of the meetings, Sherry, and she provided me with a PowerPoint presentation in regards to slips, trips and falls and how to help.
00:34:48 Speaker 2
Folks that are around that kind of scenario. So I've been looking at that.
00:34:53 Speaker 2
So my next goal now is to actually go out into our community 'cause. We do have a a large older community here, Paradise Valley, and actually share that with them at some of their meetings. And just to see if there's anything that I can do to help them.
00:35:08 Speaker 2
Their homes and things like that.
00:35:10 Speaker 3
Yeah, that's Melissa Dale.
00:35:12 Speaker 3
She she is.
00:35:14 Speaker 3
She runs the Fall prevention program.
00:35:16 Speaker 1
Yeah. OK.
00:35:18 Speaker 1
You know, sort of thinking both of you are are EMS responders. So you're both, you know, not on the prevention side as much.
00:35:26 Speaker 1
Is there anything?
00:35:27 Speaker 1
Do you think we need to be doing and what's missing from the current road safety education?
00:35:33 Speaker 1
Law enforcement efforts in the state that could help the Ms. Community hopefully respond less to these kinds of incidents.
00:35:42 Speaker 2
From my side, before I retired, I was working for a medical company over in Belgrade for a couple of years and I said to one of the young ladies that worked in my team. I said, oh, I said, I just got.
00:35:58 Speaker 2
Call up for jury duty, I said.
00:36:02 Speaker 2
Know, she said.
00:36:03 Speaker 2
She.
00:36:03 Speaker 2
I did that, she.
00:36:04 Speaker 2
Well, I was in college, I said.
00:36:06 Speaker 2
Did you go?
00:36:07 Speaker 2
She said I was on the jury says for two full weeks there was like a dozen cases per day and every one of them was a DUI for two weeks.
00:36:20 Speaker 2
I would just love to see some kind of program that communicates to people how bad the situation is for people drinking and driving and we seem to accept it when you know we turn up on these accidents and so on.
00:36:36 Speaker 2
We take care of the patient, but at the same time, it's like you're not.
00:36:40 Speaker 2
You didn't help yourself here, you know, and I wish there was some kind of program, either statewide or even nationwide, that would bring that to the forefront, because I think it's a huge problem.
00:36:53 Speaker 3
How do you instill?
00:36:57 Speaker 3
A sense of responsibility in people and a a sense of responsibility in their actions and how those actions impact other people.
00:37:08 Speaker 3
You know I.
00:37:09 Speaker 3
You know, I I don't have the answer.
00:37:10 Speaker 3
Think we had the answer to that.
00:37:13 Speaker 3
We.
00:37:13 Speaker 3
We may make some headway.
00:37:15 Speaker 1
You'd be a millionaire.
00:37:16
You know.
00:37:18 Speaker 3
I think house comes back to the responsibility of each and every one of us to conduct ourselves in a way that's not potentially harmful to others.
00:37:28 Speaker 1
There's some Traffic Safety commercials, specifically from the United Kingdom that really emphasize, you know, the why. And I think that's something that I always found really impactful, you know, like.
00:37:45 Speaker 1
Why do you wear your seat?
00:37:46 Speaker 1
And if you think about it, you might not be doing it for yourself, but you do it so that you can get home to your loved ones.
00:37:54 Speaker 1
You know, same with helmets. If you're a motorcycle rider.
00:37:57 Speaker 1
Like.
00:37:58 Speaker 1
Maybe it's less comfortable to you, or maybe it's, you know, not something that is normally a choice you would want to make.
00:38:06 Speaker 1
If it increases your chances of making at home 'cause you know Chris.
00:38:10 Speaker 1
Your case, you know you were.
00:38:11 Speaker 1
You were.
00:38:12 Speaker 1
You were driving correctly.
00:38:15 Speaker 1
And it was completely out of your control. And you know, you got rear-ended by another driver.
00:38:21 Speaker 1
Didn't even see coming and I.
00:38:23 Speaker 1
I think you know how. How can people really think about the situations like you might be the best motorcycle rider in the world, but you're on the road with folks who maybe are not always making the best choices and and we want everyone to get home safe to.
00:38:37 Speaker 1
At the end of the day, and.
00:38:39 Speaker 1
And although you know your injuries have persisted, you know you're here and and you're working toward, you know, hopefully someday getting to as close to a hundred percent as you can. You know, we'll keep working on that and.
00:38:53 Speaker 1
Is there any other messaging Chris that you would want folks to know or things you would?
00:38:58 Speaker 1
Want them to really hear from your story?
00:39:02 Speaker 2
I would like to see more programs in regards to getting people into the volunteer EMT world. I was looking at how many firefighter medics are in the US and I think it's something like don't quote me on the numbers, but it's like one point four million.
00:39:20 Speaker 2
Of which eight hundred thousand of volunteers, which is absolutely incredible.
00:39:25 Speaker 2
And it's still not enough.
00:39:27 Speaker 2
So how do we get more people? Especially when I look around, even our station, you know, we're all getting on a little bit in life.
00:39:36 Speaker 2
How do we get younger people into this field?
00:39:41 Speaker 2
Currently, even though I've only been in E M T, I got my license. I think it was first of April last year.
00:39:47 Speaker 2
I'm already teaching two young ladies that joined our fire station.
00:39:51 Speaker 2
I'm going through all the EMT lessons with them so they can then take the EMT course and hopefully get some newer people in into our department.
00:40:00 Speaker 2
But I think that would be a good thing.
00:40:02 Speaker 2
Is how do we advertise this more to get people into this kind of field?
00:40:08 Speaker 2
There's definitely a need for them.
00:40:10 Speaker 1
Yeah. Sherry, can you speak a little bit more to the need here in Montana and if folks are interested, what are their first steps?
00:40:18 Speaker 3
Yeah. One of the things that I find really interesting is looking at the the data within the Department of Labor Licensing.
00:40:27 Speaker 3
And there's over seven thousand licensed emergency care providers in the state.
00:40:34 Speaker 3
But of those under four thousand of them are actually actively working on EMS agencies, either as volunteers or as.
00:40:44 Speaker 3
Paid.
00:40:45 Speaker 3
So there's there's a lot of people with with the license in their pocket that are not utilizing that.
00:40:52 Speaker 3
You know, maybe just a a call to action.
00:40:56 Speaker 3
For those folks to say we what do we need to do to to bring you into the field? And I think, you know, some of it is.
00:41:04 Speaker 3
Is generational and people just don't have.
00:41:08 Speaker 3
They don't have the time they're having to work multiple jobs to make ends meet and don't have the time to volunteer.
00:41:14 Speaker 3
We certainly need them in the workforce. We just ran some numbers on volunteers in Montana.
00:41:23 Speaker 3
And the number was right around fourteen hundred.
00:41:29 Speaker 3
Volunteer emergency care providers.
00:41:31 Speaker 2
Hmm.
00:41:32 Speaker 3
In the state.
00:41:34 Speaker 3
So that's not very.
00:41:35 Speaker 3
You know, some of those are on multiple departments.
00:41:38 Speaker 3
I honestly don't know how to appeal to people. Personally. I was born into.
00:41:46 Speaker 3
I can remember as a child the firefighting in the House, you know, and my parents responding on the ambulance. One of my three kids is a firefight.
00:41:56 Speaker 3
One of my kids that doesn't have interest in it, one of the things that that she told me is that it taught her about selflessness and and there is there is that that.
00:42:11 Speaker 3
Within all of us that respond is a selflessness. To understand that sometimes the needs of others are greater than our own.
00:42:18 Speaker 3
And just being able to, you know, give back to your community and be.
00:42:24 Speaker 3
You know, when the community has a need. It's a way to fill that their sleepless nights and and that doesn't appeal to a lot of people.
00:42:32 Speaker 3
Today I'm working on five hours of sleep 'cause. I went to Bozeman at midnight last night, but that's just what we do as emergency responders gets into your blood.
00:42:40 Speaker 3
You know, one of the things I was going to mention.
00:42:44 Speaker 1
Ah.
00:42:45 Speaker 3
About motor vehicle crashes and how I try to have a positive impact is every time I respond to a motor vehicle crash or a motorcycle crash and somebody 's got a helmet on or somebody has seatbelts on. I thank them.
00:43:01 Speaker 3
You know and and that comes from my heart because I'm not having to then make those decisions about what is the best place for that dramatically injured patient to be you know, to try to save their life because they've done that on their own they took.
00:43:18 Speaker 3
Step so you know so it.
00:43:24 Speaker 3
My life easier.
00:43:26 Speaker 3
As a responder in caring for them, I always make a point to thank them.
00:43:32 Speaker 1
Yeah. And I I can hear you getting a little emotional and I appreciate you sharing that.
00:43:38 Speaker 1
I've got to think that, you know you you've been in this for many years, but.
00:43:43 Speaker 1
These sorts of incidents.
00:43:45 Speaker 1
Must have such an impact on the lives of our emergency care providers.
00:43:51 Speaker 1
You know, I think that's another thing people can take away from. This is, you know, you're not just impacting your life or the life of your family, but you're also impacting the lives of everyone who tries to help you in a situation like this. And maybe that's.
00:44:04
Just.
00:44:04 Speaker 1
One more thing someone can think about when they get into a car after they've had.
00:44:08 Speaker 1
Alcohol or they get into a car and wonder whether or not put on their seat belt or on a motorcycle and wondering whether or not put on their helmet is the impact their decisions have on others and hopefully they can think twice.
00:44:22 Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:44:22
Yep.
00:44:23 Speaker 3
You know their families and beyond.
00:44:25 Speaker 3
Way beyond.
00:44:28 Speaker 1
Just logistically, Sherry, if anyone is interested in becoming an EMT or or an EMR, sort of those lower levels of of emergency care provider, what are the first steps they take?
00:44:41 Speaker 3
I would contacting their local.
00:44:46 Speaker 3
EMS or fire provider to see if they offer classes.
00:44:50 Speaker 3
Many of the the local.
00:44:54 Speaker 3
Response agencies will provide e M R e m, T courses. Many of the colleges in the state provide.
00:45:05 Speaker 3
Em T, A, e, M, T and paramedic courses.
00:45:07 Speaker 3
And there's also private companies that provide that just to Google search will bring some of those up. But I would really encourage them to to contact their local response agency because they can point them in the right direction and give them that, that education that they need.
00:45:26 Speaker 3
'Cause, I can't think of one agency in the state that wouldn't be eager to bring somebody on board that was interested.
00:45:33 Speaker 1
Well, now I love the focus you had of you know, this is a way to give back, you know, not everyone can donate thousands of dollars to charity, but this is a a donation of time and a donation of self. And I think it is a great way.
00:45:47 Speaker 1
People to get more involved in their community and to help make sure that their community is the safe and protected as they can be.
00:45:54 Speaker 1
So you know, if anyone is interested, I would definitely recommend following Sherry 's advice.
00:46:01 Speaker 1
Is there anything else that either of you wanna make sure our listeners know or hear from today's podcast?
00:46:08 Speaker 3
Well, I would just say on the education side of it is you know, it's also a good career.
00:46:15 Speaker 3
There's a ground ambulance, there's air ambulance, there's fire service, EMS.
00:46:22 Speaker 3
There's working in medical facilities. There's there's quite a bit that can be done.
00:46:26 Speaker 3
Done with an EMT or a paramedic license today in Montana, you know, and and maybe maybe if you if you chose this as a career then you could also do some volunteer time in your community.
00:46:42 Speaker 1
Chris, any other final thoughts?
00:46:45 Speaker 2
Yeah, the.
00:46:45 Speaker 2
Thing I would add to that is, as Sherry said, if you if you do it as a full time career, it can be very rewarding both from a personal standpoint and depending on what level you get to monetarily as well. If you do it as.
00:47:00 Speaker 2
Full time position.
00:47:02 Speaker 2
However, as a volunteer position.
00:47:05 Speaker 2
It's not like you have to go on every call.
00:47:07 Speaker 2
You can still go through the EMT training get, get your license, and just go on as many calls as you possibly can. You don't have to do every one of them, but it still helps the community.
00:47:20 Speaker 2
And that's what we need.
00:47:22 Speaker 3
Yeah.
00:47:23 Speaker 3
You know, and and there's we used to call them non traditional.
00:47:27 Speaker 3
You know, there's there's things that that EMS and fire service agencies need that that don't necessarily require you to respond to calls. If that's not your thing.
00:47:38 Speaker 3
You know, some of the responders might respond, but they have small kids at home.
00:47:42 Speaker 3
Offered it offered to watch the kids while somebody runs a call.
00:47:48 Speaker 3
If you're, if you're great with bookkeeping, you offer to do some financial work for the.
00:47:53 Speaker 3
There's just there's so many things outside of the traditional response mode that that is useful within these volunteer agencies especially.
00:48:04 Speaker 3
Yep.
00:48:05 Speaker 1
Thank you.
00:48:07 Speaker 1
Did you want to tell us? Just as we wrap things up, what does the EMS program at the state do? And?
00:48:16 Speaker 1
How do they?
00:48:17 Speaker 1
Help the EMS providers across the state.
00:48:20 Speaker 3
Sure. Yet the Department of Health in EMS and Trauma Systems.
00:48:24 Speaker 3
Have a regulatory and we have a supportive function.
00:48:26 Speaker 3
That's our regulatory function is licensing EMS agencies.
00:48:31 Speaker 3
And then on the supportive side, we provide education.
00:48:36 Speaker 3
We provide quality improvement through our we have an electronic patient care record that's provided to all of the agencies in the state and they provide data through that and then we work with that data and give it back to them to help them improve the care that they.
00:48:53 Speaker 3
So we're pretty, pretty proud of that program.
00:48:57 Speaker 3
And we work with the Helmsley Trust has been very generous in our state, with our EMS providers, and we've had several grants to provide equipment to EMS agencies.
00:49:11 Speaker 3
The last one was the law enforcement AED Grant that we managed.
00:49:17 Speaker 3
And provided automated external defibrillators to every law enforcement vehicle in the state, and we have seen tremendous success with that program and many lives saved at which Chris understands the importance of early Defibrillation.
00:49:33 Speaker 3
And the reason that that works is.
00:49:35 Speaker 3
That program has been so impactful is because law enforcement is out on the streets and they get there much quicker than EMS does.
00:49:44 Speaker 3
And so they bring that defibrillator to the scene and are able to defibrillate people before EMS arrives.
00:49:51 Speaker 3
For those that are in sudden cardiac.
00:49:52 Speaker 3
So that's been very impactful, very proud of that, that program.
00:49:57 Speaker 3
So, so just a lot of a lot of continuing education is provided through our office, a lot of Technical Support. You know people have questions.
00:50:05 Speaker 3
They can always contact our office and we can, if we don't have the answer, we can point them in the right direction.
00:50:10 Speaker 3
The the one piece that we don't do in our office is the licensing of emergency care providers.
00:50:16 Speaker 3
That's all done through the Department of Labor and it's regulated through the Board of Medical Examiners.
00:50:21 Speaker 3
So. So there's kind of that split and they regulate the initial education.
00:50:28 Speaker 3
At all levels of emergency care providers.
00:50:30 Speaker 3
But again, you know we're able to provide support to those folks.
00:50:36 Speaker 3
And get them the information that they.
00:50:37 Speaker 3
We have our emergency Care Advisory Committee that works closely with the board.
00:50:43 Speaker 3
So we have a really good relationship now with that office which helps.
00:50:52 Speaker 3
The system as a whole to be able to provide.
00:50:57 Speaker 3
Again, education and information for all of the agencies in the state.
00:51:03 Speaker 1
Well, thank you both for joining us today.
00:51:06 Speaker 1
I really appreciated you sharing your story, Chris, and and Sherry helping to provide some some additional information from an EMS.