The UST Faculty of Medicine and Surgery Life Support Training Center (UST FMS LSTC) hosted the International Emergency Cardiovascular Care Regional Faculty Workshop last October 11, 2016 at the Skills Laboratory for Health Sciences.
Mr. Robert Wales, the international program development manager of the American Heart Association (AHA), shared the updates and plans of AHA in the near future with the teaching staff and coordinators from the 18 training sites in the Philippines. Issues, concerns, and possible opportunities were taken up.
Wales commended anew the support of UST FMS LSTC in disseminating AHA lessons for survival. In 2014, the AHA gave the Center a special award for its unselfish sharing of expertise. Since then, the number of students trained on life support courses in the country has quadrupled.
For the past few months, aside from conducting the regular life support training courses, the Center also reached out to individuals with limited or no medical background.
On October 3, 2016, the Center conducted an AHA Heartsaver CPR AED course exclusively for 70 UST Junior High School faculty members at the Benavides Auditorium. The course was a video-based, instructor-led activity that teaches adult and child cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and automated external defibrillator (AED) use, infant CPR, and how to relieve choking in adults, children, and infants. This course utilized AHA’s research-proven practice-while-watching technique, which allows instructors to observe the students, provide feedback, and guide the students’ learning of skills. The course instructors were medical doctors Larry King, Mary Josephine Ruby Tiongson, Patria Punsalan, Maria Rosario Cabansag, Kristine Gonzaga, Solita de Jesus and Registered Nurses Arsad Palinta and Abegail Mendoza.
Realizing the importance of disaster preparedness, the management of Lagen Island Resort in El Nido, Palawan invited the Center’s faculty members to conduct life support training courses from October 13 to 15, 2016.
King, Tiongson, Punsalan and Gonzaga conducted on Day 1 an AHA Heartsaver First Aid Course for lifeguards, boatmen, waiters, cooks and other resort crews. The organizers also presented video-based and instructor-led courses that teach critical skills to respond to and manage an emergency in the first few minutes until medical service arrives. Attendees learned the duties and responsibilities of first aid rescuers; appropriate first aid for medical emergencies like severe choking, heart attack and stroke; and skills for handling injury including external bleeding, broken bones and sprains, and bites and stings.
On the second day two AHA Heartsaver CPR AED courses were conducted, and on the third day, the Heartsaver First Aid course was repeated. A total of 52 participants undertook the CPR AED course and 48 resort staff benefited from the First Aid course.
The El Nido Resort invited the UST team in June 2015 where more than 80 resort personnel participated. This was followed by the request from the Island Cove Resort in Cavite asking for a Heartsaver First Aid and CPR AED courses for 40 staff members of the resort. The courses were held during the last week of September. In UST, the security guards went through a similar training in June of this year.
At present, the UST FMS LSTC offers Basic Life Support (BLS), Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support (ACLS), ACLS for the Experienced Provider, Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS), Heartsaver First Aid, Heartsaver CPR AED. The newest offering is the Airway Management Course.
