The words of Ben Gurion “All the country is a front…” have never echoed louder than today, in Israel, post October 7th.
The first few minutes following injury are the most crucial ones. Performance of life saving procedures for victims of trauma on site, including controlling life threatening bleeding and managing compromised airways, can make the difference between life and death.
Following the atrocities of October 7th and the relentless missile attacks countless Israeli communities were forced to come to terms with their vulnerability and the potential necessity to provide lifesaving first aid to victims of high energy penetrating trauma.
Frontline Emergency Medicine mobile unit (F.E.M) was created in response to this urgent need by Dr. Debra Gershov West -the department head of Assuta Ashdod Emergency department and leader in Emergency medical education- with the support of the Australian Jewish medical community.
F.E.M is the first Mobile simulation unit run by Emergency Medicine physicians skilled and equipped to train first responders on site in life saving first aid, and mass casualty events.
Emergency Medicine taught by the top-level emergency specialists
As of today, F.E.M emergency medicine staff has trained over 2,000 first response health care workers ranging from medics, paramedics, nurses and physicians. F.E.M reaches isolated border communities, nationwide from the southern Gaza Envelope to the northern border of Lebanon.
The F.E.M project joined forces with the Health Research and Science in Israel (NGO)
F.E.M has run training programs of multidisciplinary trauma teams in the hospitals on the Lebanese border in the heart of the conflict in the North, as well as tactical training for their affiliated medical school- Bar Ilan University to prepare our future generation of Israeli physicians.
We do not know what tomorrow will look like, but moving forward together in protecting the sanctity of life is the way of our nation.
Am Yisrael Chai.
Debra Gershov West, MD, Manager of the project
Caroline Ohayon, MD, Deputy Manager of the project
