Reflections on EMS Expo

Posted by Patrick Lickiss on Sep 14, 2011 in EMS 2.0, General | 0 comments

Sorry it’s taken me so long  to get around to writing this.  Life seems to move pretty quickly and suddenly it’s been a week going on two since I got back.  First of all, for anyone who has never taken the opportunity to attend a large-scale EMS event like EMS World Expo or EMS Today, I highly recommend it.  This was my first year and I can’t say enough about the experience.

THE PEOPLE
During the past year and a half I’ve had the opportunity to collaborate with some amazing folks in the EMS community.  We’ve developed projects, shared best practices and traded stories about what we enjoy the most about our respective systems.  The interesting part is that I’ve done all of this collaboration largely through social media.  What EMS Expo represented for me was an opportunity to meet these people face to face and to continue to forge collaborative relationships to help advanced EMS as a true medical practice.

For me, the week kicked off on Tuesday night, about an hour after my plane touched down at the airport.  Charlotte and the team at Zoll hosted an EMS Blogger Bash at the Hard Rock Cafe on the Las Vegas Strip.  What I had assumed would be a small meet up of 25 of 30 people grabbing drinks was actually an impressive event with about 100 attendees.  It was nice to see that this many people “got it” and that a company like Zoll was on the same page as the rest of us.

As the week wore on, I had the opportunity to meet EMS practitioners from systems around the country and the world.  I met everyone from volunteer First Responders to system Medical Directors and everyone in between.  Each of these people was drawn to Las Vegas by something they felt was important.  For some it was likely a great reason to party.  For others, however, it was the same as my reason for coming: the opportunity to meet with like-minded professionals with a vision for where the future of EMS will take us.

THE CLASSES
There were an amazing array of presentations available to choose from.  The Expo is separated into “tracks” like “BLS”, “ALS”, “Operations/Management”, etc.  Given my penchant for turning EMS into a clinical practice, I tended to choose clinical topics, though there were often several courses offered at the same time which caught my attention.  I particularly enjoyed Paul Pepe’s presentation on the dangers of pre-operative fluid resuscitation in trauma patients and Sean Smith’s advanced toxicology lecture.  I hope to post more on these and the other courses I took at a later date.

On the final day, I had the opportunity to sit in on Justin Schorr’s lecture:  ”How a Blog Saved my Life”.  I’ve had the opportunity to work with Justin on a variety of projects recently and I had a vague notion of why he got into blogging.  This presentation, however, was a real eye-opener.  Afterwards, I began reflecting on what brought to the EMS blogging world and that reflection has allowed me to refocus my efforts and re-evaluate where I want to go with this project.  In fact, I encourage all of my readers to think about what got you into EMS and why you are still here.  You may find that your answer to those questions can provide clarity about your future in this business.

THE SOCIAL MEDIA
On top of being my first trip to Las Vegas and my first EMS Expo, this trip provided me with a variety of other firsts.  For instance, working with other bloggers from FRNtv, we launched Interventions a quarterly online magazine meant to inspire change from within the EMS community.  I also had the opportunity to record several videos for EMSworld.com which will be released at a later date.  And finally, after years (literally) of listening to EMS Garage, I was invited on as a guest.  Once that episode is published I’ll be sure to let you know.  The same day, Scott Keir graciously asked me to guest on the First Few Moments podcast which should also be posted soon.

My time in Las Vegas and the personal and professional connections I already had in placed merely solidified for me the power of social media.  I hope that you will consider a trip out to either EMS World Expo or EMS Today.  Both are amazing opportunities for fun, education and networking.  I can’t believe I waited this long to attend.

Image via Flickr