Wilderness Medicine Magazine

Wilderness Medicine is the magazine published by the Wilderness Medical Society (WMS), which also publishes the journal Wilderness & Environmental Medicine. Over the past 25 years, Wilderness Medicine has evolved from a simple single color newsletter of a few pages with notes about WMS activities, to 4-color, glossy, 32-page magazine that has become a highly informative and entertaining publication. This most recent issue (Volume 25, #2, Spring 2008) takes the magazine to new heights.

There is a special section entitled Wilderness Reflections that features "North Appalachia November," "Our Big Patient" (environmental theme), "Generation 'W' - The Next Generation of Wilderness Adventurers and Wilderness Medical Experts," "The Joys and Challenges of Field Research in Remote Wilderness Areas," and "Education at 18,000 Feet."

It gets better from there, with articles about identifying poisonous plants, profiling certain past presidents of the WMS, food for the trail, advice about lower back pain encountered during scuba diving and swimming, wilderness medicine on top of the world, wilderness medicine at the Medical College of Georgia, and more.

The layout is attractive, the images sharp and colorful, and the commentaries extremely well written. I am very proud of the Editor, Chris Van Tilburg, M.D., and the editorial staff, headed by Jonna Barry. They continually strive to make Wilderness Medicine a "great read," and judging by this particular issue, are succeeding greatly. This is truly a great benefit to being a member of the WMS, so check it out.

Preview the 25th Anniversary & Annual Meeting of the Wilderness Medical Society, which will be held in Snowmass, Colorado July 25-30, 2008.

Tags: WMS, Wilderness Medical Society, wilderness medicine, outdoor medicine, healthline

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25th Anniversary & Annual Meeting of the Wilderness Medical Society

It is a great pleasure to announce the 25th Anniversary and Annual Meeting of the Wilderness Medical Society. It's hard to believe that it has been 25 years since I collaborated with Ed Geehr, M.D. and Ken Kizer, M.D. to create the WMS. "Combining Your Profession With Your Passion" has been the theme since the beginning, and the meeting this summer is no exception. You can register and learn more about the meeting at the WMS website, specifically at the link to the meeting.

The meeting will be held in Snowmass, Colorado, and will feature up to 49.5 continuing medical education (CME) and 46.25 Fellowship of the Academy of Wilderness Medicine (FAWM) credit hours for participants, including lectures, skills instruction, 49 different workshops, special evening presentations, and a WMS 25th anniversary gala celebration. The Wilderness Medicine Skills Practicum will be presented by the Wilderness Medicine Institute (WMI) of the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS), and Military Medicine Lessons: Applications in a Wilderness Environment will be another, additional special pre-conference session.

The evening events are outstanding, and include "The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge" featuring National Geographic Society grantee Jonathan Waterman, "What's Your Everest? - Combining Your Profession with Your Passion" featuring Dr. Luanne Freer, "Public and Global Health Issues in 2008: A Surgeon General's Perspective" featuring Richard H. Carmona, M.D., the 17th Surgeon General of the United States, and the WMS 25th Anniversary Celebration with reception, silent auction, dinner and awards, and the first-ever "Wilderness Ball."

The faculty for the meeting is a "Who's Who" of wilderness medicine, including Howard Backer, Brad Bennett, Jolie Bookspan, Michael Callahan,Tom DeLoughery, Lance Ferguson, Peter Hackett, Gordon Giesbrecht, Colin Grissom, Eric Johnson, Lee Kaplan, Peter Kummerfeldt, Jay Lemery, Mel Otten, Phil Rasori, Brownie Schoene, Joe Serra, Chris Van Tilburg, and many others.

Please make plans to join us as we celebrate the 25th anniversary of the WMS with one of the year's outstanding meetings. I look forward to seeing many of you in Snowmass.

Tags: Wilderness Medical Society, WMS, wilderness medicine, outdoor medicine, healthline

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2008 Wilderness & Mountain Medicine Conference

It always gives me great pleasure to announce the continuing medical education (CME) meetings sponsored by the Wilderness Medical Society. The next great event is the 2008 Wilderness & Mountain Medicine Conference, which will be held at The Canyons Resort in Park City, Utah from February 23-27, 2008. Registration for the meeting is available at the WMS website.

Following the theme of last year's successful winter meeting, this event will emphasize issues related to winter environments and activities. There will be a pre-conference Level 1 Avalanche Course, taught by Exum Utah Mountain Adventure guides, Utah Avalanche Center, The Canyons Ski Patrol, and WMS faculty. This is both a didactic and hands-on program designed to allow the participants to learn about safe travel in avalanche terrain, avalanche transceiver use, and snowpack analysis. They will practice efficient rescues with avalanche beacons, and study avalanche victim physiology and medical treatment. This is a certificate program, so that after completion, the participants will be recognized by the American Avalanche Association. There will also be a post-conference Advanced Wilderness Life Support Certification Course.

One of the strongest features of the WMS programs is delivery of optional workshops, which for this meeting will include Introduction to Backcountry Touring, Avalanche Awareness on Snowshoes or Skis, Snowmobile Safety, Ski Patrol Trauma Evaluation, Improvised Splinting, Litters and Packaging, Snowshelters, and Snowshoeing.

The special evening presentations look spectacular. Attendees and guests will be entertained by Andrew McLean on "Extreme Skiing," Dr. Luanne Freer on "What's Your Everest? Combining Your Profession With Your Passion," Dr. Geoff Tabin on "Ophthalmology in Extreme Environment," and Scott McIntosh and Apa Sherpa on "The History and Culture of Sherpas on Mt. Everest: The SuperSherpas Expedition."

The body of the meeting is loaded with lectures related to avalanche, high altitude, cold weather medicine, survival, travel, trauma, and other important topics for medical professionals in wilderness medicine. It will be of great interest to all doctors, nurses, paramedics, EMTs, rescuers, educators, and others who want to be better prepared to operate and assist others in wintry climates. In addition, the meeting is designed to allow ample time for skiing, hopefully in terrific powder, at The Canyons Resort and other fantastic ski areas in Park City. The first 100 registrants who book three nights or more at The Canyons Resort receive a complimentary one-day lift ticket.

Last year's meeting was awesome, and this one is shaping up to be even better. I intend to be there, and look forward to reporting back to you after a great gathering.

Tags: Wilderness Medical Society, WMS, Wilderness & Mountain Medicine Conference, mountain medicine, Park City, avalanche, wilderness medicine, outdoor medicine, healthline

Labels: avalanche, AWLS, CME, continuing medical education, Wilderness Medical Society, winter, WMS

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Mountain & Wilderness Medicine World Congress Abstracts Part 3

As I noted in my first post about the Mountain & Wilderness Medicine World Congress, sponsored by the Wilderness Medical Society and the International Society for Mountain Medicine in Aviemore, Scotland from October 3-7, 2008, there were many excellent abstracts presented. The following is the third installment of some of the more interesting of these:

Chronic mountain sickness (CMS) is a syndrome in which person who reside for prolonged periods at high altitude develop symptoms and features that include a very high red blood cell count, enlargement of the right side of the heart (because of pressure in the pulmonary [lung] arterial system), and less efficiency of breathing. In “Hypoxic and hypercapnic responses in chronic mountain sickness,” Fabiola Leon-Velarde notes that residents living above 3000 m ( ft) in the Andes breathe less compared to acclimatized (to the altitude) newcomers, but more than sea-level natives at sea level. He further notes that persons with CMS who reside at altitude breathe like sea-level natives (e.g., they breathe less than non-CMS-stricken individuals at altitude). In a limited study, he looked at the effect of acetazolamide (Diamox), which is commonly used to prevent and/or treat high altitude illness in persons acutely ascending to altitude), on breathing in CMS persons. The preliminary observation is that acetazolamide may stimulate breathing in CMS persons.

Evan Lloyd and colleagues described, “A portable airway warming kit for use in the field.” In their abstract, they note that when hypothermia is encountered in the field, the first priority is to provide insulation to prevent further heat loss. After insulation has been achieved, the major heat loss is through breathing, where the body inhales cold dry air and exhales warm moist air. They further note that while there are many ways of producing airway warming, the problem is to make equipment that can be readily used in the field. They propose a method that utilizes absorption of carbon dioxide (produced by the body) by soda lime in a compact, lightweight package – in their suggested configuration, weighing only 300 grams. An additional benefit for their system is that it can reduce the flow rate for oxygen administration from 8 to 10 liters per minute to ½ to 1 liter per minute.

There is ongoing discussion and controversy about the benefits and ethics of training in an environment of lower (than is present at sea level) oxygen content to improve performance in athletic competition. In “Application of intermittent hypoxication exposure (IHE) to improve rock climbing performance,” Audry Birute Morrison and colleagues used a specific 15-day protocol to investigate whether or not there would be improvement in sea level climbing to exhaustion in two different climbing conditions – on a 15-degree overhanging route and on a vertical route. While the subject numbers for the study were too low to draw any firm statistical conclusion, the preliminary results were felt to suggest that IHE can improve endurance time specific to climbing, particularly on vertical routes.

More abstracts to follow…

photo of Cairngorm autumn courtesy of www.ski-injury.com

Tags: Wilderness Medical Society, WMS, International Society for Mountain Medicine, mountain medicine, Aviemore, World Congress, wilderness medicine, outdoor medicine, healthline

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