An appeal for material assistance

The successful evacuation of a seriously injured patient from an environmentally dangerous situation requires a number of techniques that can best be learned by practice through training programs, many of which are sponsored by organizations and members affiliated with the Wilderness Medical Society. Of particular need in performing these difficult tasks is a stretcher. Many variations of the Sked® are available, but a stretcher of any type  – whether flexible, rigid, wire or plastic – can make a critical rescue far more practical than having to improvise from scratch some alternative method of moving the victim.

In the Tactical Medical Column of this edition of the WMM, my good friend, former WMS Board member Gordon Giesbrecht, has published an article emphasizing the wilderness medicine skill sets applicable to the combat situation in the Ukraine. I am reaching out to all members of the WMS community to please try to find unused or surplus Skeds to ship to Gordon for transshipment to the front lines of the Ukraine.

A Sked is an important extraction device as wounded soldiers and medics are frequently exposed to ongoing hostile fire in a very precarious situation. With a flat device the patient can be rolled onto it and then dragged while the rescuer crawls away to safety.

During the cholera epidemic members of the WMS helped me obtain several of these items for use in my project in Haiti, and for that I will be forever grateful. I hope our WMS community can now help Gordon with his work in the Ukraine.

These items should be shipped to Professor Gordon Giesbrecht, Ph.D, 102 Frank Kennedy Building, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada R3T 2N2

Thanks for your help!

William W. Forgey, M.D., FAWM, CCHP-P, CTH

Past President, WMS

[email protected]