DAYTON, Ohio Shauntel Hass worked as a registered nurse at a hospital when she decided to take her career in another direction. Upward.
The 35-year-old Mountain Home, Idaho, native joined the Air Force and spent her first day in training this month at the U.S. Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. There, she will earn flight nurse status, a job that will likely jet her across continents and oceans to care for wounded soldiers returning from battle.
Before boarding a U.S. military plane to treat wounded servicemembers, medical teams from the Air Force, Army and Navy earn the wings on their flight suits at the school, which was transferred to Wright-Patt three years ago as part of the Base Realignment and Closure commission.
Reporters from this newspaper this month accompanied members of the Air Force Reserve 445th Airlift Wing, based at Wright-Patterson, on a 12,000-mile journey to Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan that also included an evacuation and transport of 11 wounded patients from Ramstein Air Base in Germany to Joint Base Andrews in Maryland.
The reserve wing has an aeromedical team, drawn largely from the ranks of civilian health care professionals in the Miami Valley.
Patient care at high altitudes has its challenges part of the training at the School of Aerospace Medicine. The school graduates about 300 flight nurses and technicians from its weekslong aeromedical courses each year.
"What we're teaching them is how to take those skills and those capabilities and how to step it up to a point where they are going to be working in an environment at 35,000 feet, which is very unusual," said Lt. Col. Karey M. Dufour, the Wright-Patt school's flight nurse course director and contingency operations chief.
"When you take a patient up to altitude, those stresses of flight really do make a big difference in how we treat our patients. There's certain considerations that we have to make. Otherwise, our patients can really deteriorate very quickly."
Critical care teams of flight doctors and nurses tend to the most severely wounded troops.
"The patients we take in the air are more critical than you're ever going to see in any level one trauma center because of all of the multiple trauma that they have," said Lt. Col. Elena Schlenker, the school's director of critical care courses, which graduate another 125 students or so a year.
See more here:
Military medical teams earn wings at Wright-Patt aeromedical school
- "Shift Happens" [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Getting Started With Your Personal Statement [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- I started this blog 1 year ago. I'm ready to become a medical doctor. [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Poll Results: "What is your GPA?" [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Why Ross University School of Medicine? [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Why Ross University? (Continued) [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Filling out applications with the last 4 years in mind. [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- "Active and Passive Euthanasia" [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- 300 Word Personal Statement - First Draft [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- 300 Word Personal Statement - 2nd Draft [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- "Where did you do EMT training at?" [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- "is this jonathan that went to brazil in the summer of 2006?" [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- First Application is Away - Ross University [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- AMCAS—The American Medical College Application Service [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- The Student Doctor Network [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Crime Incident - Public Safety Announcement: STUDENTS [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- AMCAS Deadlines & Delays - Answered [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Headstart on Secondary Applications - The Student Doctor Network [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- The Complete Medical School & Admissions Guide - Revisited [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Interview Status - Ross University [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Finished my first interview. [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- "You have a 95% chance of acceptance..." [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- "I was just wondering if I have to go to medical school i will have to start college allover again." [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Interview Feedback - Allopathic Medical Schools - Ross University School of Medicine (Dominica Caribbean) [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- ACCEPTED! [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Step 1 Revisited [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- A Few More Thoughts On Moving [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Update [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Closing In [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Internet/Computer Hell [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Back On The Net [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- 1 More Day [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Loan Deferment Blog [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Graduated! [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- What Happened? [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Interesting Case [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- What Made Me Stupid? [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Blah. [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Call [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Medicine in the Media [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Was Medical School Worth It? [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Off I Go... [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Is It Worth It, Part 2 [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Oriented [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- GLBT in Medical School [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- GLBT in Residency Applications [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- I Survived [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Reflections on the First Week [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- All Good Things Must End [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- The Lone Coyote is Back [Last Updated On: November 8th, 2009] [Originally Added On: November 8th, 2009]
- Pre-med student switches gears to teach in Chicago school - Chicago Tribune [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- Old-school barbecue coming to spot near Fort Worth medical district - Fort Worth Star Telegram [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- Nursing home drug use puts many at risk - Boston Globe [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- Dr. Anita Figueredo, first female surgeon in San Diego, dies at 93 - Los Angeles Times [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- Stimulus funds pay for monkey research in NC - MiamiHerald.com [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- Medicine as an economic engine - Buffalo News [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- UM medical school feels the squeeze - MiamiHerald.com [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL ADVISER Bell's palsy not as serious as it appears - Detroit Free Press [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- Baylor medical school works to get back on track - Houston Chronicle [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- From community college to Amherst College and Yale Medical School - WalletPop (blog) [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- Man questions merit of coke monkey study - UPI.com [Last Updated On: March 8th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 8th, 2010]
- School Board has questions it wants answered about onsite medical clinic - Terre Haute Tribune Star [Last Updated On: March 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 9th, 2010]
- Stimulus Funds Pay for Monkey Research - NewsMax.com [Last Updated On: March 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 9th, 2010]
- Babylon schools head: Teen's collapse unrelated to athletics - Newsday (subscription) [Last Updated On: March 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 9th, 2010]
- Cost Of Medical School Rises In Recession - NPR [Last Updated On: March 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 9th, 2010]
- Flu Shots in Children Help People of All Ages - New York Times [Last Updated On: March 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 9th, 2010]
- A prescription for improving science education - Scope (blog) [Last Updated On: March 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 9th, 2010]
- Live kidney donors do not die sooner: study - Reuters [Last Updated On: March 9th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 9th, 2010]
- UW football player suspended after alleged assault - Seattle Post Intelligencer [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- More Comparative Studies Needed to Guide Physicians Study finds less than a ... - ModernMedicine [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Conservationists worry about Mo. med school plan - KOAM-TV [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Dr. William D. Lynn - Baltimore Sun [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Suspect in North Dallas shootings became reclusive after parents died, family says - Dallas Morning News [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Drinkers Gain Less Weight - Harvard Crimson [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Long-Term Health Risks Low for Kidney Donors - WebMD [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- School resource officer remains in critical condition - Middletown Journal [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- New Lucian Leape Institute Report Finds That U.S. Medical Schools Are Falling ... - PR Newswire (press release) [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Dual degrees program expands for Mayo Medical School students - Post-Bulletin [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Comparative Effectiveness Research is a Must - TopNews United States [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]
- Long Beach OKs medical pot ordinance - Contra Costa Times [Last Updated On: March 10th, 2010] [Originally Added On: March 10th, 2010]