It was New Year’s Day and Tammy woke up with a little heartburn. Or so she thought. Within hours her heart stopped and doctors performed emergency cardiac surgery. But her condition worsened and her only chance of survival was getting her to a consortium hospital and a higher level of cardiac intensive and surgical care.

After a conference call with Tammy’s doctors, the Boston MedFlight team—always ready and waiting to respond to the sickest of the sick at a moment’s notice—headed for southern New Hampshire in one of our critical-care ground vehicles.

The return trip took 90 minutes. Every mile of the way we used our intensive cardiac-care skills to keep Tammy alive. We managed the heart pump and the ventricular-assist device. We gave her multiple, hemodynamic-agent infusions and medications to stabilize her heart rhythm. We did everything a cardiac intensive care team would do in a hospital cardiac ICU. Only we were in the back of a moving vehicle on I-93.

Meanwhile, we also kept the receiving hospital updated on Tammy’s condition. By the time we arrived, they knew exactly what steps needed to be taken first. From the hospital in New Hampshire, all the way to Boston and into the waiting arms of the receiving team, we made sure Tammy’s care never skipped a beat.

“Every single day I think about the whole experience,” she says. “Every turn was a miracle, and it’s because Boston MedFlight knew what they were doing.”

Tammy

Without Boston MedFlight’s incredibly skilled teams, gravely ill patients like Tammy wouldn’t get the lifesaving care they so desperately need. Every day of the year, doctors and medical teams at hospitals throughout New England depend on us as an integral part of the critical-care continuum.