Nelson County EMS demonstrates latest equipment upgrades to Nelson Fiscal Court
By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette / WBRT Radio
Tuesday, Aug. 6, 2019 — Nelson County EMS Director Joe Prewitt provided Nelson Fiscal Court Tuesday with a comparison of the current state of emergency care, and a glimpse of how the county’s investment in advanced equipment will improve EMT and paramedics’ ability to save lives in the field.
The demonstration came at the beginning of the meeting, and included two separate EMS crews demonstrating the lifesaving techniques in use now, and those that represent the future of emergency healthcare.
Using a lifesize “Sim Man” mannequin, a two-person EMS crews worked on the patient in a scenario where the individual suffered a heart attack and was found unresponsive. The crews showed each step of their lifesaving efforts using old equipment versus the latest, state-of-the-art equipment.
One member of the two-member EMS crew must drive the ambulance to the hospital, and that leaves the other crewmember working by themself in the back of the squad. He or she must continue with CPR — in most cases, using one hand — while using the other hand to complete other tasks.
The second EMS crew faced the same scenario, but they had the new heart monitoring equipment that fiscal court recently purchased for the ambulance service. The second EMS crew also had a Lucas CPR device that automatically took over the mechanical CPR compressions.
The CPR device freed the EMS crew member in the back of the ambulance to have both hands to handle other patient care needs.
“This is the future of where we’re going,” Prewitt told the court of the new technology.
LANDFILL EXPANSION. As part of the plans to expand the county’s landfill, the county is planning to build a new sewer line from the landfill to the City of Bardstown’s sewer treatment plant.
The landfill must pump leachate — the liquids that flow out of a landfill — to the sewer plant to be treated.
John Greenwell, the county’s solid waste coordinator, told the court that a larger, newer line would be a good move to serve the new and future sections of the county landfill.
The court approved to seek engineering requests for proposals to design a new sewer main to serve the landfill.
In other business, the court:
- discussed changes to the county personnel ordinance that may include a social media policy for on-duty county employees.
- approved plans to rehab another baseball backstop at Dean Watts Park.
NEXT UP. Nelson Fiscal Court next meets at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Aug. 20, 2019. The court will hold a public hearing regarding the proposed tax rate at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, Aug. 21, 2019.
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