Air Evac helicopter visits health care, journalism campers
Stephanie Schiraldi |
Local high schoolers get hands-on with health care and journalism at Lipscomb's summer camps this week
Students in the Lipscomb-HCA/TriStar Health Care Academy put their skills to the test this week in a mock hiking accident scene that concluded with an Air Evac Lifeteam helicopter landing in the quad outside of the Burton Health Sciences building to help the mock patients.
Thirteen participants at Lipscomb-THSPA Journalism Camp, also occurring on campus this week, were working in groups to produce three separate stories about the Health Care Academy, as well as serving as fake patients for the future health care providers to practice on.
The Health Care Academy is an annual summer program that introduces students to a variety of health science professions related to pharmacy, nursing, nutrition and exercise science. Students gain hands-on experience and receive instruction in CPR, basic first aid, use of an EKG and AED, and non-invasive measurements such as blood pressure and pulse rate.
As part of the experience, the 23 participants were able to visit TriStar Summit Medical Center on Monday, June 8. Corrina McGee, a rising junior at Memphis Central High School, said they were able to tour everything from the blood bank to the emergency room to the surgery lab.
The participants started the day Tuesday, June 9, learning the basic skills they would need to care for a victim who tripped over a yellow jacket nest in the woods: preventing anaphylactic shock, treating an injured arm and protecting a possibly injured neck. The simulation ended with an Air Evac Lifeteam helicopter from Lewisburg, Tenn., landing nearby to pick up the “patient.”
During the simulation, participants were guided through the process by health care professionals who provided valuable information such as what to give a diabetic patient to drink (Gatorade) and how to act when contacting the victim’s family about the accident (to remain calm).
“Each professor told us about each kind of injury, like neck injury, cuts, bites and lacerations – it was simple first aid things,” said McGee. “Then we came out here and simulated it on an actual person from the Journalism Camp (which was also happening on campus).”
Air Evac Lifeteam members told participants about the Bell helicopter, the equipment inside and showed the stretcher used to transport patients.
The annual Lipscomb-THSPA Journalism Camp (Tennessee High School Press Association) conducts sessions on news writing, feature writing, sports writing, design/layout, editing, photography and video.
The journalism campers learned these valuable skills and other writing tips from Lipscomb professors like English professor Dana Carpenter.
“She was teaching us about doing journalism with a nonfiction point of view, like writing a journalistic novel except it’s in article form,” said Aziza Cunningham, a rising senior at Hume Fogg Magnet High School, Nashville. “It was the perfect marriage of two different styles of writing.”
Amber Steigelfest, a rising junior at Harpeth Hall School in Nashville, said the campers took classes on the basics of journalism as well as an ethics class. She said her favorite part was producing a mock news broadcast where the campers took turns working the cameras or serving as the anchor.