Student EMTs not just along for the ride

In a sea of proud families and green caps and gowns, three university students dressed in navy stand out of the crowd at the Bob Carpenter Center — and the stretcher and medical bags beside them only add to their conspicuousness.

Graduate student Charlie Mitchell and sophomores Anthony Prizzi and Alejandro Morales, part of the University of Delaware Emergency Care Unit, an EMS squad composed entirely of student volunteers, are standing by at Delaware Technical and Community College's raucous graduation ceremony, waiting to see if any graduating seniors or audience members need assistance.

UDECU is often called to attend university functions, such as on-campus concerts and the DelTech graduation, in addition to being on call for emergencies.

The EMS squad is composed of approximately 50 members, with a working staff of ten students per semester, director of membership Melissa Crandall said. She said the group is kept small so that members get sufficient training and experience in the field.

"We get to handpick who we want," Crandall said. "You don't get training if you only go on one or two calls a month."

UDECU receives anywhere from zero to eight calls per day, said Mitchell, a current member and first-year graduate student who worked for UDECU throughout his undergraduate career at the university. The squad is the first to be called for all on-campus emergencies and often backs up Aetna Hose Hook & Ladder Co. if Aetna is unavailable to respond to an off-campus emergency.

UDECU members are trained to handle a variety of emergency situations, from cardiac arrests to alcohol overdoses, and members are used to treating university community members, Mitchell said. He said he has had to care for his own professor before.

Sophomore Prizzi said he often sees students he has treated around campus.

"That happens, like, every day," Prizzi said. "Especially since I live on campus I'll see people in the dining hall all the time."

However, due to patient privacy laws, the EMTs are barred from talking about any calls they have taken, even afterward with the patients themselves.

Mitchell said UDECU often gets called for non-emergency situations, in which students have no other way to get to a doctor or a hospital but are in need of medical assistance. New member Morales said students' perception of what constitutes an emergency may be different from that of an EMT, but that does not affect the quality of care.

"If it's an emergency to them, it's an emergency to us," Morales said.

The EMTs said calls can be sporadic throughout the week, and each day is unpredictable. During downtime, the members often ride around in their 10-year-old ambulance or hang out at their headquarters, studying for exams or watching television on their new widescreen TV.

A common superstition among UDECU members is that if one of them says, "It's really quiet tonight," calls will come pouring in, Prizzi said.

"And if you watch Ladder 49, you'll get two calls," said senior Jeff Sands, a UDECU member.

Mitchell said the EMTs are conspicuous both on campus and while taking calls elsewhere, due to their uniforms and choice of vehicle.

"People often stare at us and think we're going to an emergency, when we're really going to dinner," Mitchell said.

Prizzi said people often joke about the EMTs' obvious youth. He said he worries community residents will be uncomfortable with young people treating them, he said. 

Mitchell said in part because of their student status, the members of UDECU are held to the highest of standards. At their headquarters on South Chapel Street, plaques demonstrating the group's accomplishments line the walls of the living area, one of which reads, "Striving for Excellence in Campus EMS."

"The level of care is a lot better than other places," Mitchell said.

While none of the men have directly saved a person's life, they have responded to calls where had they not taken someone to the hospital, the individual in need of care probably would not have survived. Each has his own fair share of unusual stories.

Mitchell said one diabetic student he treated had such low blood sugar that he was behaving erratically and tried to fight off the EMTs, paramedics and police officers that were trying to help him. Once he was administered glucose to raise his blood sugar, the patient could not remember a thing.

Except for a collective wariness of obstetrics, the men do not feel nervous about their jobs, and have become used to dealing with bodily fluids and other medical normalities.

"I used to be a sympathetic puker," Prizzi said, but now is plagued only by a phobia of needles.

UDECU members hail from a variety of majors, including psychology, chemical engineering and, in the case of Morales, neuroscience. As a pre-med student himself, Morales said he expected there to be a lot of pre-med UDECU members. However, he said the majority are not pre-med.

Morales said while he has only been able to ride in the ambulance three or four times, he has worked as an EMT in his hometown for approximately one year and wanted to continue working at the university.

"For me, adrenaline could be a factor," he said. "This might be corny, but I really do want to help people. People are so grateful."