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Ill. EMT, 73, still going strong

Kay Palmer is a full-time respiratory therapist, works on-call for the local ambulance service, serves as the agency’s twice-monthly training instructor and has taught CPR for 30 years

Dispatch Argus

GENESEO, Ill — Kay Palmer recently looked through her childhood diary.

As a volunteer with the Cambridge and Geneseo ambulance services, she knew she’d always wanted to be a nurse, but finding that wish expressed many years before was a sweet surprise. “It was funny to see it there in print,” she said.

At 73, Ms. Palmer still is going strong. She’s a full time respiratory therapist at OSF St. Luke Medical Center in Kewanee, and on her two “days off,” she’s on-call for the Geneseo ambulance service, even sleeping in one of the six tiny bedrooms at the new fire/ambulance barn built in anticipation of the day Geneseo’s crew might go full time.

Read full story: Geneseo EMT keeps going at 73