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Published Feb. 7 by Louisville Medical Center STATCARE Community training cuts farm fatalities by 63 percent By
JOHN HULTGREN Note: additional pictures are available from STATCARE's Internet site.
Funded largely by the former STAT Flight helicopter service of University of Louisville Hospital, Dobson refined his farm safety program and expanded it to a regional level in 1994. After the STAT Flight and Jewish Hospital SKYCARE flight programs merged, STATCARE continued to support this community training, particularly since SKYCARE had been active in the Farmedic® Program. The farm safety program teaches both farmers, their families, and rescuers. Public education identifies the hazards (and hazardous practices) common to farming. Local fire departments and emergency medical services agencies are presented lectures and hands-on practice in farm machinery extrication and emergency pre-hospital medical care. Since STATCARE is affiliated with the University of Louisville Hospital (a Level 1 Trauma Center), Jewish Hospital HealthCare Services (a world-renowned microsurgery and limb reattachment center), and Kosair Children's Hospital, it was only natural for STATCARE to help provide instruction in farm machinery extrication techniques and the most current medical care practices for victims of major (or limb) trauma. In 1998 Dobson was appointed by Commissioner Billy Ray Smith as the Farm Safety Field Officer for the Kentucky Department of Agriculture. With state support, Dobson is now able to take his farm safety program throughout all of Kentucky. The Department of Agriculture has also established a grant program that assists counties in developing and coordinating farm and home safety programs. Dobson's program now includes participation from the State Fire Rescue Training (KCTCS), the Kentucky Farm Bureau, the University of Kentucky Extension Service, and flight programs from Louisville Medical Center STATCARE, the University of Kentucky Air Medical Services, St. Joseph Careflight, Welborn Life Flight (Evansville, Ind.), University Air Care (Cincinnati, Ohio), and Vanderbilt LifeFlight (Nashville, Tenn.). Sometimes multiple flight programs work together in the same training session, again proving the deep commitment that air medical programs have in reducing injuries and fatalities in their community. The result: farm accident fatalities in Kentucky have been reduced 63 percent, from 48 deaths in 1995 to 18 deaths in 1999. For more information, contact:
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![[Kentucky EMS Connection]](../../images/logo2.gif){kind=logo}
LOUISVILLE
— Kentucky had an unpleasant distinction in the early 1990s:
farming was three-times more dangerous in Kentucky than any other
state in the nation. Three adjoining Kentucky's counties -- LaRue,
Hardin, and Nelson Counties -- had the highest number of
farm-related injures in the nation. So in 1994 LaRue County EMT
Dale Dobson started holding farm safety schools on his family's
farm, and after Dobson's father was critically injured in a
farming accident, Dobson expanded his program to include
additional training for fire departments and EMS agencies. ![[Kentucky EMS Connection]](../../images/KEC_log3.gif){kind=small}