“C.I.T.! ,C.I.T!, C.I.T., WE NEED A TEAM!”

The call to action can and does crackle out of our Motorola pagers at all hours of the day or night. The Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) is the volunteer arm of the Cambria Community Healthcare District (CCHD). CCHD provides emergency medical care services (Paramedics, EMTs, etc.) in the general Cambria area, which is rather large—810 square miles! Rudimentary medical testing (blood pressure, oxygenation levels and the like) is also available free at the CCHD Station.

I volunteered and was accepted for CIT in December and completed training in Februrary 2009. The function of the Crises Intervention Team is to provide aid, services and support to the spouses and families of victims of medical emergencies, which includes accidents of any kind, homicides, suicides, natural deaths or any other type of event which involves the Cambria Paramedics, CHP, SLO County Sheriff’s Dept., Cambria Fire or CA State Parks.

CIT members provide appropriate services for people in immediate need; things like transport of family members to hospitals if needed, travel arrangements, meals and lodging where necessary, emotional and practical support for family members in the case of death (natural or sudden and accidental). Basically, we try to provide almost any services that are needed during the first 24 hours after an “event”. We also provide on-scene services at fires where the Cambria Fire Dept. responds. Our services are extended to any visitor in our district, which is quite a number since this is primarily a tourist-oriented area. And CIT’s services are free.

Since I completed training, I have been on five calls. Normally, there are two persons on each “team”. I’ve had four “transport” calls, which are the most common, all between midnight and three in the morning. My other call was an “11-44” which is an event involving a death.

A 50-year-old man had a massive heart attack and died while jogging on Moonstone Drive at 9:00 on a Sunday morning. He and his wife were vacationing here from Southern California and, because she was off doing something else, she didn’t learn (from a deputy sheriff) of his death for four hours. Naturally she was traumatized and in shock. We spent seven hours with her coordinating all sorts of things that needed to be done (you’d be surprised how complicated dying can be). She insisted on seeing her husband’s body, which is unusual, but understandable. This was difficult for me since I had to make sure the body went from the emergency room to the on-call mortuary and that his body was okay for viewing, since he still had all the tubes, IVs, and other medical devices the medical people used on and in his body, plus he had a huge contusion on the side of his head due to his hard dive to the pavement. We finally got her on her way home, thanks to a close friend driving her, which we had arranged, at about 10:00 that evening.

Our CIT in Cambria is one of only a few similar organizations in the country. I know the services and support we provide are greatly appreciated by those that need it. I find it both challenging and rewarding personally—it’s both exciting and disturbing. I’m just glad I can contribute so concretely to my community.

Ronan Taken In The First Round

Ronan Teetzel celebrated his first birthday by inviting friends and families over to his Amherst Street home for a lively get together. Contrary to initial reports, despite the presence of several radicals from the “Sixties” generation, the California National Guard was not required to maintain order and propriety. The Palo Alto PD were quite sufficient!

Attendees grazed upon a vast selection of delicious food and libations. Birthday cake was the center of the attention by those self same Radicals, while Ronan and his crew, although acknowledging the frosty mountain with “Ronan” inscribed on it, eschewed the sugary delight in favor of a healthy selection of fruit and veggies. Major incidents of the day included; the mutilation of an intrusive species in the form of a yellow piñata, a sing-a-long of “Happy Birthday,” Ronan’s analytical decision making between a mango, a book, or money (he took the money to the delight of those degenerates from the ‘60s), and a contest of who could take the most photos of Ronan in three hours (results are still being tabulated). His parents also had a great idea: Guests were not to bring a birthday present but rather something small enough to fit into a “time capsule” (decorated as a gallon paint can) that Ronan will open on his eighteenth birthday (NO CHEATING, Rachel and Erik, you too also have to wait 17 years to know the secrets of the time capsule)!

Statistically, guests averaged the highest rating of the party on their exit questionnaires. The afternoon’s affair was surreptitiously recorded, and is here revealed exclusively below on CAMBRIAN PATHWAYS.

Snap Shots…..

Todd just back from Indonesia and is back at work at Culver City Middle School. He had a wonderful time his wife Melissa; they did numerous outdoorsy type things, including many hikes. The photograph below is Todd standing before Merapi, an active volcano that last erupted in 2006.

Our Marine Mammal Center team from Morro Bay rescued this young northern elephant seal on a beach in Pismo Beach. It was born in either December or January of this year. Its problem was that a stingray speared him; you can still see the stingray’s barb on the left side of the seal’s throat. The prognosis is excellent for a full recovery. By the way, we named the seal “Irwin” to recognize Animal Planet’s Steve Irwin who was killed several years ago when a stingray’s barb pierced his heart.

Drew watches a bit anxiously as Danny helps Lexi learn to ride her bike without the training wheels in front of their Copperas Cove, TX home. The afternoon’s teaching and learning were successful and Lexi is now an official two-wheel rider!