THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 29, 1994 TAG: 9407270116
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 01B EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Pam Starr
LENGTH: Long : 107 lines
It costs $160,000 - double the price of a regular ambulance - but worth every cent in case a disaster strikes Hampton Roads.
The Sentara Medical Transport Stat One is a fully equipped operating room on wheels, the only one of its kind in the region. This state-of-the-art ambulance is regularly used to transport critical care cardiac patients to Sentara Norfolk General Hospital from community hospitals, but its primary purpose is to provide critical care services during disasters such as tornadoes and hurricanes.
This is definitely not your run-of-the-mill hospital taxi. In fact, it goes way beyond your typical advanced life support ambulance. The Sentara Medical Transport paramedics who ride in this high-tech machine like to show off its equipment and capabilities but they say they hope and pray that they never have to use them.
``We responded to a hazardous materials incident in Ivor and the evacuation of the Autumn Care nursing home in Suffolk,'' said paramedic Eugene H. Eskey III as he took a visitor through the year-old ambulance, which is kept in Virginia Beach at Sentara Medical Transport offices on Arrowhead Drive. ``We went to Petersburg tornado strike last year . . . this has mass casualty capability.
``But we've never done a surgery and hope we never do.''
The ambulance's features are impressive. Stat One can give oxygen to 40 people at once, 200 feet from the ambulance, and transport six patients - four of them fully monitored and on stretchers. Regular ambulances are not required to have child safety seats, but Stat One has two.
It has a 1,000 pound capacity side mounted lift which can be used as a wheelchair lift. A 7,500-watt generator and a battery charging system keeps the electric equipment operating. A refrigerator is used for certain medications and a microwave oven warms fluids. It even has a surgical light inside which stays cool when in use. A complete supply of necessary drugs, blood and intravenous products are stored within the 14-foot-long vehicle.
Floodlights come off of the truck and can light up the scene. An EKG machine will spit out a graph of a patient's heart beat and be faxed to the hospital en route. Other pieces of equipment include six cardiac monitors, six portable infusion pumps, cellular telephones, a radio transmitter (121 channel capacity), multiple stretcher devices and pediatric care supplies.
Some people may think that the Stat One is overkill, said Dr. L.D. Britt, but he said an ambulance with disaster capability is a necessity for Hampton Roads. Britt is the medical director of the Shock Trauma Center at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital and had a hand in how the ambulance was designed and equipped.
``I told them (at Sentara) what I would need in the event that I would have to do procedures in the field,'' said Britt, also the professor and chairman of the Department of General Surgery at Eastern Virginia Medical School. ``We would have been remiss not to consider this. I thought it was something we needed in this area - hopefully a disaster will not happen, but we have a major military base and an airport.''
The Children's Hospital of The King's Daughters has an intensive care unit-type ambulance for pediatric patients, he added, and the Stat One is modeled after that. Britt said one of these ambulances is enough for this region, just so that medical personnel are ``prepared.''
``I'm sure Hampton Roads won't always be excluded from a disaster,'' he said. ``Hopefully we'll never need it but we have to be realistic - you have to be prepared in the event of a major catastrophic event.''
LAST SUMMER OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY nursing professor Dr. Carl Helvie thought of a different way his Community Health Nursing students could earn part of their grade.
He had the students create and distribute a pamphlet outlining all of the available resources and services for the homeless and low-income families and individuals in Virginia Beach and Norfolk. The students, all registered nurses who have returned to school to obtain a bachelor of science degree, even raised $700 for printing costs.
Helvie said that he came up with the idea because he has worked with the homeless for nine years and knew that population needed a brochure like that. This summer his students are updating the brochures and are again paying for the printing.
``I thought it was something my students could do,'' said Helvie. ``They raised $500 this time - they've sold doughnuts, held raffles.''
The brochure is extensive and divided into two sections, one listing resources for the homeless and one listing resources for low-income people. Information on prepared meals, canned foods, shelter, shower facilities, clothes, laundry and health care is given for the homeless. For low-income families and individuals, listed resources include food, housing, clothing (thrift shops), child care services, utility assistance, health care and job training.
Each easy-to-read entry gives a location, a description, hours of operation, requirements and a contact person. The new brochures will be ready on Aug. 1, said Helvie, at various places.
``We put the brochures in police stations, social services, libraries, public health departments, shelters - anywhere a homeless person would go for help,'' he said.
If you would like copies of the brochure, call Carl Helvie at 683-5251. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photos by MORT FRYMAN
Paramedic Eugene H. Eskey III shows off the interior of Sentara
Medical Transport's Stat One ambulance that can provide critical
care services during disaster situations.
Stat One is a fully equipped operating room on wheels, the only one
of its kind in the region. The 14-foot vehicle that can give oxygen
to 40 people at once and transport up to six patients at once, has a
7,500-watt generator, a refrigerator, a microwave oven, an EKG
machine that can fax the graph to the hospital, cellular telephones,
a radio transmitter and medical supplies.
by CNB