Wilderness First Responder

Wilderness First Responders are individuals who are trained to respond to emergency situations in remote locations. They are part of a wide variety of wilderness medical providers who deal with medical emergencies that occur in wilderness settings.

History

Near the end of the 19th century, volunteer organizations such as St. John Ambulance began teaching the principles of first aid at mining sites and near large railway centers. By the dawn of the 20th Century, additional organizations such as the Boy Scouts and the American Red Cross began teaching first aid to lay people. Over the years, these organizations trained hundreds of thousands of people in the elements of providing assistance until definitive care could be arranged.

The training in these courses assumed that definitive care was nearby and could be delivered quickly. Eventually it was realized that this training, while valuable, needed to be supplemented and/or revised to deal with the extended time and limited resources inherent when a medical crisis occurs in a wilderness setting. In the 1950s, organizations such as The Mountaineers began developing training programs that addressed these special needs.

First responder

A first responder is an employee of an emergency service who is likely to be among the first people to arrive at and assist at the scene of an emergency, such as an accident, natural disaster, or terrorist attack. First responders typically include police officers, firefighters, paramedics, and emergency medical technicians. A Certified first responder is one who has received certification to provide pre-hospital care in a certain jurisdiction: for example, the Certified First Responder in France. A community first responder is a person dispatched to attend medical emergencies until an ambulance arrives. A Wilderness First Responder is trained to provide pre-hospital care in remote settings, and will therefore have additional skills in ad hoc patient packaging and transport by non-motorized means.

Issues

First responders must be trained to deal with a wide array of potential medical emergencies. Because of the high level of stress and uncertainty associated with the position, first responders must maintain physical and mental health. Even with such preparation, first responders face unique risks of being the first people to aid those with unknown contagions. For example, in 2003 first responders were among the earliest victims of the previously unknown SARS virus, when they cared for patients affected with the virus.

National Outdoor Leadership School

The National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) is a non-profit outdoor education school based in the United States dedicated to teaching environmental ethics, technical outdoors skills, wilderness medicine, risk management and judgment, and leadership on extended wilderness expeditions and in traditional classrooms. The NOLS mission is to be the leading source and teacher of wilderness skills and leadership that serve people and the environment. NOLS runs courses on six continents, with courses in a variety of wilderness environments and for almost any age group.

Courses feature both leadership and technical outdoor skills, which include backpacking, canoeing, whitewater kayaking, packrafting, caving, rock climbing, fly fishing, horse-packing, sea kayaking, mountaineering, rafting, sailing, skiing, snowboarding, and wilderness medicine. NOLS has trained more than 280,000 students. Academic credit is available for all courses, through either the University of Utah, Western State Colorado University, or Central Wyoming College. NOLS also has direct credit agreements with many colleges and universities. NOLS is headquartered in Lander, Wyoming.

Outward Bound

Outward Bound (OB) is an international, non-profit, independentoutdoor-education organization with approximately 40 schools around the world and 200,000 participants per year. Outward Bound programs aim to foster the personal growth and social skills of participants by using challenging expeditions in the outdoors.

History

The first Outward Bound school was opened in Aberdovey, Wales in 1941 by Kurt Hahn, and Lawrence Holt with the support of the Blue Funnel Line. Outward Bound grew out of Hahn's work in the development of the Gordonstoun school and what is now known as the Duke of Edinburgh's Award. Outward Bound's founding mission was to give young seamen the ability to survive harsh conditions at sea by teaching confidence, tenacity, perseverance and to build experience of harsh conditions. James Martin Hogan served as warden for the first year of the school. This mission was established and then expanded by Capt. J. F. 'Freddy' Fuller who took over the leadership of the Aberdovey school in 1942 and served the Outward Bound movement as senior warden until 1971. Fuller had been seconded from the Blue Funnel Line following wartime experience during the Battle of the Atlantic of surviving two successive torpedo attacks and commanding an open lifeboat in the Atlantic ocean for thirty-five days without losing a single member of the crew. From the inception of Outward Bound, community service was an integral part of the program, especially in the areas of sea and mountain rescues and this remains an important part of the training for both staff and students in Outward Bound, Wales. The first Outward Bound program for females was conducted in 1951. Fuller was seconded to the USA in the early sixties to help establish the Colorado Outward Bound School, Outward Bound USA, and the first Peace Corps training camp in Puerto Rico.