Soon-to-be ER Doctors Ride With Pa. EMS

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July 12--YORK, Pa. -- Manchester Township Deputy Fire Chief Joe Madzelan was explaining the logistics of taking a car apart and extracting a crash victim.

"Our goal, obviously, is not to do any more harm to the patient," he told the 21 audience members, mostly York Hospital medical residents, at the York County Fire School on Monday afternoon.

Behind him, a handful of firefighters from Manchester Township and Manchester Borough used a variety of hand-held and hydraulic tools to efficiently strip the doors and roof from a white Pontiac Grand Prix -- kind of like a reverse assembly line.

This was the fourth year York County's first responders conducted the EMS Skills Day, according to Dr. Dan Bledsoe, director of pre-hospital care for York Hospital. The goal is to teach emergency-room physicians how first responders care for patients before they get to the hospital.

Bledsoe said this year's class included 11 residents who just finished medical school, as well as six medical students in their final year doing their rotations at York Hospital. There were also four associates with Glatfelter Insurance Group, which Bledsoe said is the country's largest insurer of firefighters and emergency medical workers.

Bledsoe said the hospital used to designate a day for students and residents to tag along with paramedics, but that was inherently unpredictable. This way, all participants get basic knowledge of a first responder's job.

The day's lessons also included performing CPR in a moving vehicle and moving patients while keeping their spines immobilized.

After watching the firefighters take apart the car, the students donned protective gear to try it themselves.

Yemi Adebayo was among them. He's in his last year at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and will spend the next month working in York Hospital's emergency room.

Adebayo said he hadn't realized how many different components go into first response, from helicopters to firefighters to paramedics.

"It's important to know what first responders' job entails," Adebayo said.

Participants

Participants in EMS Skills Day at York County Fire School on Monday:

--- York Hospital Medic 97

--- WellSpan Disaster Response Team

--- Manchester Township Department of Fire Services

--- STAT MedEvac

--- West York Ambulance

--- Union Fire Company of Manchester