Emergency Medicine Education and Resources

Washington Regional’s emergency department provides the area’s highest level of trauma care. “We are a level two trauma facility. We get a lot of transfers from Oklahoma, or from the VA or just smaller facilities around Arkansas,” says Autumn Olson, RN. “We are also the only comprehensive stroke center in Northwest Arkansas. So, when a patient comes in by EMS and they are a stroke alert, we get them straight to CT. We have about a 15-minute window for the physician to come and assess the patient. We also have a comprehensive stroke team ready and in facility to assess the patient and see what further treatments we may need to do for them.”...

Warm, sunny weather offers the opportunity for fun outdoor activities and also, unfortunately, the potential for heat-related illness. “Here in Northwest Arkansas, it’s definitely important to stay mindful of heat illness as we get going into summer,” says Dr. Ryan Mantooth, an emergency medicine physician at the Washington Regional Emergency Department....

Nearly 900 children have died in the past 25 years after being left inside vehicles that got too hot, making pediatric vehicular heatstroke a leading cause of transportation-related death for children in the United States. But it is preventable. “There is no safe amount of time to leave a child in a vehicle,” says Dr. Sammy L. Turner, an Emergency Department physician at Washington Regional Medical Center. In just 10 minutes on a mild 85-degree day, the temperature inside a vehicle can rise to 104 degrees. Studies show that even leaving windows “cracked open” does not reduce the rate of temperature rise inside the vehicle....