By Michael Riley
Asbury Park Press (New Jersey)
Copyright 2006 Asbury Park Press
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News
Getting to the hospital may be the trickiest part of the journey for very ill children.
The transport services department of the K. Hovnanian Children’s Hospital at Jersey Shore University Medical Center in Neptune moves about 500 children of all ages, including premature babies, in a single year. The transport team brings children here from all over the region and even from out of state.
In response to a call, a team of professionals moves into action.
There are economies of size at work in this sort of business.
“The ambulance comes equipped with 20 different size breathing tubes,” says Dr. Bruce Grossman, of the pediatric intensive care unit. “The EMTs need to be able to treat children of all sizes, from a 7-pound infant with asthma to an 18-year-old trauma patient.”
Defibrillators have smaller paddles. Everything is geared down, even as the work amps up the EMT team, which deals not just with the patient but sometimes a very worried parent as well.
“Children are little people,” says specially trained EMT Vanessa Truszkowski. “And we need both sympathy and empathy to work with the whole family.”
The technical aspects, like which size breathing tube to use, she says, become almost second nature with experience.