Fair medics save a life

PALMER — So what kind of injuries do the medics at the Alaska State Fair usually respond to?

There is, of course, the occasional sprained ankle. Or maybe a dehydrated reveler. A few years ago, a motorcycle fell on a guy’s ankle in the parking lot.

But are they ever called on to save a life? Turns out they are. It happened just this year, in fact.

Saturday, with two days left in this year’s 12-day festival, the fair’s parking manager was the first on scene when help was summoned for a woman in one of the parking lots having a seizure.

Fair Marketing Director Dean Phipps said the manager thought the woman was already gone. She’d turned blue, but the medics were close on his heels.

“A team of three immediately responded to the patient, who was unconscious and not breathing. They examined the patient and began working on the individual’s oxygen and pulse. After obtaining a patient history, the team also gave the patient an injection of anti-seizure medication. Within a few minutes, they began to see positive signs,” according to a fair press release.

A Mat-Su Borough ambulance and paramedics soon arrived, taking the woman to Mat-Su Regional Medical Center. By the time she got there, the fair reported, she was conscious, sitting up and talking coherently.

“A paramedic returned to the fairgrounds later to thank the fair team for their great work,” according to the press release.

“They are unsung heroes, and we are so thankful for them,” Phipps said in the statement.

Medical staff is provided each year by Alaska Professional Volunteers Inc., a group that trains medics and provides services to events around Alaska.

The group’s president, Roy Sursa, said in the fair’s press release that the group has 125 members volunteer to work this year’s fair, some from as far away as Valdez, Tok and Fairbanks.

At any time there could be 37 working the fair, but there’s never fewer than six and they staff the event 24 hours a day. The team put in more than 3,000 hours for this year’s fair. Each year, according to the fair, medics treat between 400 and 500 patients.

According to the group’s website, the fair offers a chance for doctors, medics, nurses and other medical professionals to network and gain experience, skills and “patient contacts.” Volunteers are given two tickets the day they volunteer and two more tickets for some other day.

“We furnish all supplies and equipment except for your personal items and basic EMS gear (shears, note pad, etc.). Anything you may need to stay overnight you will need to provide (sleeping bag, etc),” according to the solicitation for volunteers.

Phipps said that the fair doesn’t pay the medics, but instead donates money to APV.

“It’s a longtime, successful partnership,” he said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or

andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.