Men and women certified to respond to emergency situations in the outdoors are putting their skills to the test with the University of Wyoming Outdoor Program’s three day long Wilderness First Responder Recertification course.
Outdoor Program interim director Cynthia Dywan said they host the recertification course each January for certified wilderness first responders to come and recertify their certification that expires every two years. During the course, participants will be tested on how much medical information they remember from previous trainings, which could have been two or three years ago, she said.
“Every year there are new updates that they want the participants to know the most current information on how to best help people,” Dywan said.
One of the first things participants in the course experience is a test similar to the final test from the original certification training, she said. Dywan said the course instructors use the information from those tests to see who they need to focus on and what areas they need to review.
“If you get a particular grade (on the test) or higher they (are) just refreshing you with the new information and things that they think are important and things people have a tendency of forgetting,” Dywan said. “The recertification starts out with an exam at the beginning, which is very similar to the exit exam for the full course, just to see where you are at and how much you have retained.”
People attend the course to maintain their certification, such as it is required for work, being prepared to give medical attention and using it as an excuse to come to Laramie, she said. Because of this a mix of state and federal employees and students from the university often take this course, Dywan said.
“We have people from all over the place that need it for their jobs because they work for another company that requires it like the United States Forest Service or the Bureau of Land Management or Wyoming State Parks,” she said. “Some people use it as a way to visit a different place, so someone from Chicago, (Illinois), could come up and take the course here because they happen to want to visit Laramie.”
Outdoor Program Trip Leader Zayne Hebbler said it is important for people who are often in the outdoors to know how to handle different medical incidents because anything could happen when they are out on trips for the program.
“It is really important for my own personal recreation, knowing how to respond to a situation,” Hebbler said. “We talk about a huge smattering of medical issues, anything from dealing with cardiac arrest to seizures to sunburns, joint dislocations.”
Dywan said people can still register for the recertification course until Friday. The Outdoors Program is also hosting a wilderness first aid class in March that covers similar topics as the recertification course, she said.
“There is a cap of 30 participants for the recertification, but this year we only have about 20 people signed up,” Dywan said. “You have to recertify every two years to stay certified, there is a one year grace period so people could take three years but that one year they are not technically certified but they are still able to do the recertification.”
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