Bike Team

Imagine yourself at a large concert, you and a group of your friends are walking through the large crowd of fans that have come to listen to music and enjoy a beautiful day outside. Suddenly your friend clenches her chest and falls to the ground. You notice your friend's lips turning blue and you scream "HELP! Somebody call 911!" and a feeling of panic overcomes you. Within a minute you notice two bicycles rapidly moving through the crowd that has formed around you and your friend is now unconscious. Two Paramedics jump off of their mountain bikes, one grabs a small machine and the other begins CPR. The Paramedics provide two lifesaving electrical shocks to your friend, a breathing tube is placed to help your friend breathe, and an IV is started to give medications. You can now hear the ambulance coming, but it is still not within sight. You hear the Paramedic say "We have a pulse!" and you turn to look at your friend. She is now breathing on her own and her heart has started to beat again. The ambulance arrives and your friend is placed on an ambulance litter and transported to the hospital.

Bicycle EMS Teams are a relatively new concept in the pre-hospital field. The idea is to have a provider capable of moving rapidly through dense crowds in an attempt to get to sick or injured patients. In the scenario above, the patient would have waited close to six minutes until a conventional ambulance was able to navigate its way through the crowd of people. In a medical emergency, every second counts in saving lives!

Bike Team providers are capable of providing emergency care to sick or injured patients until a conventional ambulance arrives on the scene to transport the patient to the hospital. Bike Team members carry most supplies that are available on the ambulance, including airway support equipment, and Automated External Defibrillator (AED) to provide electrical counter shocks to patients in cardiac arrest, and medications to treat a variety of emergency conditions

Bicycle Paramedics and Emergency Medical Technicians have proven their ability to save lives with rapid response times and proficient emergency medical care on multiple accounts. The Lancaster EMS Bicycle Team is just one of the specialty teams that Lancaster EMS offers to the community it serves. For more information about the Lancaster EMS Bicycle Team, please contact the Bike Team Coordinator, Leeann Haas at leeann_haas@lemsa.com or by calling (717) 481-4841.