Life Flight crew's job never the same twice

MOSES LAKE — When there’s an emergency, a fast response can make all the difference.

Emergencies don’t always happen at convenient times or places; however, which is why Dominic Pomponio landed in places like Frenchman Coulee when he was flying.

Pomponio is now the regional vice president for the Life Flight Network, an air medical transport service with 10 bases in Washington, including Moses Lake. The service area includes portions of Idaho, Oregon and Montana. It’s one of a number of similar services that cover the Pacific Northwest.

“You just don’t know what the day is going to hold for you,” Pomponio said.

Flight nurse Tim Beard said crews might be sent to a rural hospital to transport a critically ill patient, then two hours later land in a helicopter on Interstate 90, or maybe take a burn patient to Harborview Medical Center in a fixed-wing aircraft. And, the emergencies aren’t always in out-of-the-way places. Sometimes a rural hospital won’t have the equipment or resources to care for a patient, and the air transport will be crucial to getting them the care they need, he said.

“No two days are alike in my job,” he said.

Sometimes the case is really unusual.

“I was on the call when we flew Chief from Moses Lake to Pullman,” Beard said. “That’s a once-in-a-career call.”

Chief is the Moses Lake Police Department K-9 who was shot through the eye while chasing a fleeing suspect with his handler, Officer Nick Stewart, in February. The bullet missed Chief’s brain, but it caused removal of his eye and extensive damage to his jaw.

The Life Flight crew had just taken a patient to Portland, Beard said, and were asked to go to Moses Lake without knowing anything about the patient until just before takeoff. But it’s not unusual for crews to be sent on a call without knowing much about the patient.

And in one sense, Chief wasn’t much different from any other Life Flight patient. Beard said the dog probably would not have survived without air transport.

“We are a mobile ICU (intensive care unit),” Pomponio said. “It’s that critical care link.”

Air transport crews, like other health care workers, have had to take extra precautions in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. As of Dec. 15, Life Flight had transported 616 patients who tested positive for coronavirus, and 685 who eventually tested negative.

In one way, crews have always had to take the possibility of infectious disease into account, Pomponio said. But the coronavirus added an extra layer of complexity.

“It certainly has brought more acute awareness of the risk for contamination,” Beard said.

Jackie Marshall, a flight nurse working Monday at the Moses Lake base, said the required decontamination procedures are among the more challenging aspects of dealing with the pandemic.

“It’s time-consuming,” she said, adding up to 30 minutes, depending on the transport. “It just adds an extra layer to everything you do in health care.”

All of the crew, pilots included, wear a gown, goggles and an N95 mask when transporting suspected or confirmed coronavirus patients, Pomponio said.

“It’s hot. You have extra layers on.”

Flight paramedic Lindsay Nelson, also working Monday in Moses Lake, said helicopter transport can be especially challenging, particularly when the rotors are in motion and crews are putting on or taking off the protective gowns.

Pomponio compared it to the turnouts worn by firefighters.

“They’re not fun to wear, but they help protect you,” he said.

Life Flight transported its first coronavirus patient March 1, Pomponio said. With testing either slow or nonexistent, crews had to treat every patient with symptoms as if they had the disease.

The uncertainty had an impact.

“Nobody really knew what this was going to look like,” Beard said. “It changed not only your work life but your out-of-work life as well.”

But with time, research and better knowledge, Pomponio said, it became clear there were ways to reduce risk.

“Knowledge is power,” he said.

The air transport crews meet patients on what is one of the worst, if not the worst, day of their lives, Beard said, and get to help change that situation for the better.

“It’s very rewarding that way,” he said.

But it’s also demanding. The crew works in very confined quarters, with limited resources and a patient whose condition could change in a second. Fast and critical thinking are important, he said.

“It is not for everyone, that is for sure,” Beard said.

Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at cschweizer@columbiabasinherald.com.