Last weekend, practical training for ISAR Germany's emergency services took place at the Institute of Anatomy at the University of Düsseldorf. Members of the medical team practised various life-saving measures. These included placing chest drains - tubes that are inserted into the chest to remove air, blood or fluid from the chest cavity - securing airways, thoracic decompression punctures and placing intraosseous accesses. Intraosseous means "into the bone" and refers to procedures in which drugs or fluids are introduced directly into the bone marrow to gain rapid access to the bloodstream, especially in emergencies.
The pathology department had two specimens available for this purpose. These are deceased people who have donated their bodies for research and training. This allowed the emergency services to practise their skills under realistic conditions in order to be able to act safely on patients in an emergency.
The training was led by instructors Thomas Rolfs, Bastian Herbst and Stefan Becker. The aim was to prepare the participants as well as possible for emergencies and disaster operations.