AIDA recently announced the launch of its Freediving Emergency Medical Responder (FEMR) course, a new first aid course that includes a special emphasis on freediving-related medicine.
While traditional first aid/CPR courses contain useful information for daily medical incidents such as basic first aid, CPR, and AED use, they don’t include sufficient material on specific freediving-related injuries that can happen while training. AIDA Education Officer Brian Crossland realized the importance of this and decided to make a change.
Crossland attended a dive medic course run by Chantelle Newman, and later approached her and asked her to collaborate on a first aid course that is specifically for freedivers.
Newman, founder and publisher of “The Diver Medic,” member of the 2016 Women Divers Hall of Fame and the Explorers Club, channeled her EMS background and 34 years of scuba experience to create the FEMR course.
Along with Crossland and Dr. Oleg Melikhov, Newman put together a first aid course for freedivers.
The Divers Alert Network also contributed to the course materials, in addition to information gathered from multiple scientific papers written by professors in diving medicine.
The FEMR course differs from traditional first aid courses by introducing the pathophysiology of illnesses and injuries, with an emphasis on freediving-related injuries like barotrauma, squeezes, lung injuries, hypoxia, narcosis, decompression illness, immersion pulmonary edema (IPE/IPO), and ear injuries and treatment.
Participants in the course will also learn how to examine the ear with the use of an otoscope, how to use two airway adjuncts — oropharangeal airways and nasopharyngeal airways — and learn how to activate a diver’s insurance plan and ensure successful emergency treatment.
Participants will take the theory in person or online, and then go through practical elements and learn skills such as taking full vital signs, including blood pressure and pulse oximetry, while also treating non-freediving-related trauma injuries and medical illnesses.
The first FEMR Instructor courses will be held in Shanghai, China from October 22nd to October 26th and in Seoul, South Korea from October 29th to November 2nd.
For more info and to reserve a place, send an email to cathcrossland@gmail.com.
