Hopatcong Ambulance Explorers: Learning to Save Lives

It's the first Wednesday night of the month, and you're strapping a member of the Hopatcong Ambulance Squad onto a backboard. There's no emergency, but it's all a part of the training. Instead of strapping someone onto a backboard, you could be learning how to take care of an open wound, listening to someone's lungs or checking someone's vital signs.

It's no longer Wednesday. It's Friday at 9 p.m. and your pager beeps. Someone stopped breathing, and they need your help.

No, you're not on the ambulance squad, although the ambulance squad performs similar tasks. You're part of the Hopatcong Ambulance Squad Explorer Post No. 33. As a young adult, you're exploring the medical field and learning what it's like to be on the ambulance squad.

As part of the Boy Scouts' subsidiary Learning for Life, the Hopatcong Explorer program has been training 14- to 21-year-olds in the medical field for about eight years. Hopatcong Ambulance Squad members, EMTs, former Explorers and parents guide the members.

Every first Wednesday of the month the Explorers meet at the ambulance squad building on River Styx Road from 7-9:30 p.m. to discuss and perform drills. During drills members learn skills such as putting someone on a backboard, checking a patient's pulse, learning the right questions to ask a patient and how to use various equiptment.

Essentially, Explorers learn everything the ambulance squad does, according to Rita Russomanno, a program advisor and the ambulance squad's president.

As soon as someone joins the Explorers, Russomanno said they're put on a six-month probation period where Explorers train and discover if the program is something they really want to pursue.

"After six months if they're old enough to go on an ambulance call, they go. We watch them to see how they're handling the situation and guide them through," Russomanno said. "If they're not ready then we train them a little bit more until they're confident."

That's exactly why the advisors are there, Russomanno said. Russomanno said the Explorers run much of the program.

"Us adults, we're just advisors. They run their own meetings. They run their own fundraisers. They run everything," Russomanno said. "Everything they do and everything they talk about is them. It gives them a sense of importance. [It] makes them feel like, 'Okay I'm not just sitting here and somebody else is telling me what to do. I actually can do this.'"

Judi Wolff, an Explorer advisor and training officer, said from ages 14-16 Explorers are known as basic first aiders. They know CPR, how to backboard and split and have a general knowledge of emergency preparedness. At this point, Wolff said they can attend any Boy Scouts function as a first aider.

Once an Explorer turns 16 they receive certifications in CPR and basic first aid and begin their hands-on training. An Explorer is paired with an advisor and a trained EMT.

During meetings Explorers sign up for ambulance call duty. During the summer, duty is from 8 p.m.-6 a.m. On school nights, duty is from 8-10 p.m. Explorers try to sign-up for a minimum of three nights per month.

Until they turn 18, Explorers have some limitations, Wolff said.

Explorers can go to the scene of motor vehicle accidents, but they can't be in the car with the victim and they can't be by the vehicle when the ambulance squad cuts the victim out of the vehicle.

"But if I need a backboard, if I need a splint, they can be the runner and go get something to help," Wolff said. "So they are learning different things."

Explorers also can't go to overdoses. For CPR calls Explorers have to sit in the front of the ambulance truck.

"So they're exposed, but they're not exposed. You give them a taste of what the medical field is like without throwing them in," Wolff said.

Russomanno said an important part of being exposed to the medical field is learning how to not panic when something happens.

"As an Explorer you learn to have a clear head in situations, not only with medical emergencies but in real life. You learn how to focus on things," Russomanno said. "If an Explorer walks into a store and sees somebody fall and get hurt, instead of saying, 'I wish I could help,' these kids can now say, 'OK, I can help.'"

Katelynn Russomanno, 16, president of the Explorers, said aside from the hands-on medical training, the leadership skills and communication skills she's learned while being on the Explorers have been invaluable.

When the ambulance squad hosted mock drunk driving crashes before prom at the high school, Katelynn Russomanno said students were able to see Explorers helping out the squad.

"When students saw their friends helping out, it gave them a sense of, 'Wow that really can happen and my friends are actually doing something to help.' This is reality. It happens. And there are people out there who are going to help," Katelynn Russomanno said.

Being able to help people is one of Angelo Cook's favorite parts about being an Explorer.

"When taking calls people appreciate you so much. I love just seeing how grateful they are that you're there to help them," Cook said.

Cook said going on ambulance calls has changed him.

"Going on calls you definitely look at life in a different way than the normal person would," Cook said. "You don't take things for granted that you normally would because you realize how valuable life can be. In the blink of an eye it can all change."