Pro EMS Center for MEDICS Becomes First Paramedic Education Program Worldwide to Offer Students Fundamental Critical Care Support Course

The FCCS course, developed by the Society of Critical Care Medicine, was originally designed to teach doctors how to work in intensive care units.

Cambridge, MA, February 2011 - The Pro EMS Center for MEDICS is pleased to announce that it is the first paramedic education program worldwide to credential undergraduate students in “Fundamental Critical Care Support” (FCCS), a unique course that was originally designed to prepare doctors for working in intensive care units.
 
FCCS was developed by the Society of Critical Care Medicine to teach doctors the fundamental principles of managing a critically ill patient’s first 24 hours of care until a transfer or appropriate critical care consultation can be made. The course helps to prepare doctors for different medical scenarios in an ICU setting, including the sudden deterioration of a critically ill patient.

Pro EMS Center for MEDICS Director Chris Kerley saw the FCCS course as an ideal opportunity for paramedic students to gain additional insight and knowledge for their work in the emergency treatment of individuals. Paramedics are frequently faced with critical care scenarios, either in responding to emergency medical situations or in the transport of critically ill patients from one hospital’s emergency room, or ICU, to another.

"The current, standard Paramedic Education curriculum  hasn’t caught up with the reality of what paramedics are actually doing in the field," Kerley said. "The FCCS program provides us with the opportunity to teach our students the skills they will need to provide the highest standards in pre-hospital patient care."

FCCS is rigorous; students are given the course book two months in advance of the two-day classroom setting, and asked to memorize every lab value and other medical detail in the text. When the students enter the classroom, they are expected to be able to use the information they memorized to work through different scenarios and case studies. They are exposed to new skills and technology, from learning how to set mechanical vent settings to interpreting X-Ray and CT scans, invasive monitors, and interpreting pulmonary artery wedge pressures. By the end of the course students have learned how to analyze a patient’s condition and proactively respond to their care.

"While taking this course, our students stop thinking as paramedics and become enculturated into the ICU," Kerley said.
As the first, and only, nationally accredited paramedic program in the state of Massachusetts, Pro EMS Center for MEDICS is adding FCCS to continue its commitment of giving EMS professionals the opportunity to learn best practices in emergency medicine; to educate them about the latest innovations in technology; and to encourage them to take a leadership role in raising the standards of pre-hospital patient care.

About Pro EMS Center for MEDICS

The Center for MEDICS is the only EMS educational facility in Massachusetts to be accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs (CAAHEP) upon the recommendation of the Committee on Accreditation of Educational Programs for the Emergency Medical Services Professions (CoAEMSP).

More information about Pro EMS Center for MEDICS can be found at www.centerformedics.com or by calling (617) 682-1811.

Media contact:
Christine Dunn
Savoir Media
617.484.1660
cdunn@savoirmedia.com