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PANJSHIR PROVINCE, Afghanistan (June 20, 2008) - Six Afghan
medical providers learned basic lifesaving skills at a Panjshir
Provincial Reconstruction Team cardiopulmonary resuscitation course
held at the Rokha Clinic on June 18.
Air Force Staff Sgt. Janine Duschka, a PRT medical technician
deployed from Andrews Air Force Base, Md., taught the course.
"It is important to teach the local medical providers, because
it gives them another tool to save lives," Duschka said. "The tools
they take home with them today are not ones they have to carry in
their medical bags, and they're not something that they have to
spend their money on. They're taking home knowledge that they can
share with the rest of their staffs."
The medical providers were from six different clinics and four
of the province's seven districts.
"This training is crucial, because most of the province's health
care providers are in rural locations, so they need to be able to
do [CPR] in order to get their critical patients to the hospital or
to a better clinic," said Dr. Shirdell, Panjshir health and medical
services officer.
The CPR class is the one-day American Heart Association course
for health care providers authorized by the Military Training
Network in Bethesda, Md. It covers not only CPR for patients of all
ages, but also how to handle someone who is choking and the proper
use of an automated external defibrillator unit.
The course also focuses on how to assess a patient to see if CPR
is even necessary, and Duschka said she sees patient assessment as
one of the main tools taught by the course.
"Now the medical providers know how to assess the signs the
patient is giving instead of just reacting to a patient when they
arrive," Duschka said. "Many of the Afghan medical providers I've
dealt with in the past would have immediately started to give
artificial breathing or CPR just because a patient's eyes were
closed or they were unconscious, even if the patients were
breathing normally already."
While some of the medical providers had learned prior forms of
resuscitation, this course was new to most of them.
"They didn't have a preconceived notion of what CPR should be,
since they've never taken any of the older CPR courses, so it was
actually easier for me to teach them than it is teaching American
students," Duschka said. "These providers all know how important
this training is, and they all came ready to learn."
This is the first class out of a 15-class schedule, and I think
it went very well and we all learned something from the class,
Duschka said.
While Duschka taught her students the requirements from the
course, they taught her some creative ways they've come up with to
handle some of the trickier everyday medical situations.
For example, if a pregnant woman were choking, the providers
said, they'd use a head-scarf to wrap around the woman if they
couldn't reach their arms around her. Their solution uses an item
that every Afghan woman keeps with her.
"Even though we're taught to use everything and anything that
you have available to save the patient, using the scarf is an
ingenious option that I never would have considered," Duschka said.
"Although using the scarf is not a treatment of choice, the
solution shows the providers clearly think outside of the box to
help their patients in any way they can."
After spending the day teaching and learning from the local
providers, Duschka was comfortable they would be able to provide
better care to anyone who came into their clinics.
"If I came into their clinics, I know they could assess me,
understand what was happening and treat me properly," she said.
"Hopefully they won't ever have to use this course, but I'm happy
to have been able to give the extra knowledge."
Shirdell agreed with Duschka.
"Whether they need to use [CPR] or not, they are learning that
they always need to be in touch with the patient, and it is
important to know what to do with a patient in any emergency
situation," Shirdell said.
The PRT's CPR training program will continue throughout the
year, and Duschka said she hopes to get out to different clinics in
each of the province's seven districts.
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