Day Five

How does the lack of health care access affect population health and patient wellbeing in a community? The lack of access in a rural community can put individual’s life’s in danger. The nearest Cath Lab at the Smokey Mountains is Memorial Hospital which can be a far drive for an ambulance. If a patient has a STEMI they can have more damage done within the hour because they don’t have access to a close hospital that can take care of them. What is the biggest take away from today’s Wilderness First Aid course? Critical thinking! This course has really opened my eyes to how things can change in one second and how I may be in a position where I have to use critical thinking to take care of my patients if I do not have the resources that I think I need or any extra hands to help me. How can you incorporate some of the lessons you learned today into your care of patients back home? I believe that I can take the critical thinking skills and knowledge about wildlife and use this when taking care of patients back home because I will be quicker to think and I will be able to educate.

Today is Day Five of my Rural Health Travel Course. I did not post yesterday, so here’s a little run down:

                Yesterday, June 4^th, my travel class attended a Wilderness First Aid course at Nantahala Outdoor Center. Some of the information that we went over on this day we knew from previous nursing courses, but it is in a totally different context. As nurses in a hospital we have all of these resources at our finger tips, yet in the wilderness your left with what you packed in your bag and what is near you. We ran through many scenarios where we treated patients with spinal injuries, and other contusions. I thought my critical thinking skills were being used to the maximum potential in the hospital and in school, but I realized that trying to take care of a patient when you have slim resources and no back up for several minutes or even hours, now that takes some serious critical thinking skills. We ended our class at 4pm. We then headed back to the cabin and ate stuffed pasta shells with a salad. At 7:30 pm we headed back out to watch “Unto these Hills” at the Cherokee Mountainside Theatre. This play centered around the Cherokee and what they went through that lead up to the Trail of Tears, and what happened after this historical event. It was a great play that had a lot of meaning behind it and all of the actors did such an amazing job.

Now, back to today (June 5^th), today we all crawled out of bed and made our way back for our second and last day of Wilderness First Aid class. We learned about many topics ranging from species of snakes and which types are poisoness to lightening and where it is best to be during this. Our class ended at 4:30pm today. We all passed our course and received our certification in Wilderness First Aid. I am now back at the cabin relaxing while Hannah and Kyle prepare breakfast for dinner. I see a big plate of food and a nap in my future.