Ms Jacqueline Hennessy1
1St John Papua New Guinea, Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea
Abstract:
This presentation discusses lessons learnt from a particular aeromedical retrieval that did not go to plan, outlining how interagency diplomacy and ingenuity sometimes becomes the most important tools in the kit to get staff and patients out the other side of a mission in one piece.
As a close partner of the Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary, St John received an early morning call from Tropicair to respond to and retrieve a wounded police officer in a remote location with zero medical facilities. With no communication from the scene and the knowledge that it would take a plane, boat and 4WD to get to the patient, our aeromedical team was promptly deployed.
With a rapidly changing potential security situation and limited communications between the scene, the flight team and medical command back in Port Moresby, every decision from take-off to landing safely back in Port Moresby had to be made as a “three to go, one to say no” type arrangement. Whilst we train for most situations, plans A through C went out the window in an instant, and what followed was somewhere around plan Z of the mission brief and raised some vital lessons for our management and team on how to proceed in the future.
The presentation highlights the highly emotional side of missions and when you have no-one else but your flight partner to rely on, these heightened emotions factor greatly into survival, progress and resilience.
Biographies:
Jacquie Hennessy is the Deputy Commissioner, Chief of Clinical Operations and Chief Paramedic for St John Ambulance Papua New Guinea. She has been working within emergency medical services for eight years in PNG and NSW. The team she leads is responsible for clinical governance, innovation, and education for the National Ambulance Service. Jacquie also commands and coordinates the St John Air Medical Retrieval Service and the Ambulance Special Operations and Rescue Team. She has further tertiary education in Emergency Management, Health Service Leadership and Tactical Medicine.