Trent Johns, recent graduate of the Orcas Fire and Rescue volunteer recruit training, Marla Johns, Senior Services Coordinator, Alan Stameisen, Orcas Fire and Rescue volunteer.
By Margie Doyle
Yesterday, over 100 islanders came to the Senior Center to think about the unthinkable, “What If?” emergencies that call for serious medical evaluation and intervention.
At the Senior Center, through the collaboration of Orcas Island Senior Services, Orcas Island Medical Foundation, Hearts and Hands, Lahari Hospice and Orcas Island Fire and Rescue, island seniors were given Life Forms Packets to complete.
Volunteers from the participating organizations helped give blood pressure tests, baseline electrocardiograms, and assisted in the completion of medical history summaries and POLST (Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment) and Power of Attorney forms and “do not resuscitate”/life support directives.
The participants were also invited to partake of a free breakfast or lunch.
Mary Riveland, volunteer from the Island Medical Foundation, said that the forms may prove invaluable sooner than expected: one attendee at a previous Orcas Cares event filled the information out and the very next day, Orcas EMTs were called to her house and made use of the vital information.
She advises participants to keep the completed information, including medicines you’re taking, next of kin contact numbers, and animals that may need emergency care in your absence, together in their plastic bag in your freezer, with the “Life Forms” magnet on your refrigerator door, so that no time is wasted in an emergency.
Marla Johns , Senior Services Coordinator, said that the response was more enthusiastic than they’d hoped for. The Senior Center will probably repeat the event in the near future, she said.
The Life Forms see-through packages and refrigerator magnets to tell emergency crews where the instructions are located are available at the Senior Center off North Beach Road and the Eastsound Fire Station off Mt. Baker Road.
Indeed an amazing event. I suspect it will have a noticeable impact on the handling of future after-hours emergency calls on Orcas, and I look forward to similar events. A small correction: Mary Riveland is with the Orcas Medical Foundation (not Island Medical Foundation), the 57-year-old nonprofit that raises funds to support the Orcas Medical Center and its medical services.
Frank and I took advantage of this wonderful “event” yesterday! We urge everyone to participate in this terrific program if and when it is repeated! We are so lucky to live in a community that offers all these fine services! Being prepared is essential and reassuring!
A very, very VERY well-organized and helpful event. Marc and I learned a lot and got us to budge off our duffs to get our affairs in order …. especially the airlift off island info. Just great!