Blythedale Offers Free Pediatric CME Series for First Responders

PRLog (Press Release) - Jan. 28, 2013 - (VALHALLA, NY – January 28, 2013) Blythedale Children’s Hospital, in coordination with the Westchester Regional EMS Office, Westchester County DES, and NYS EMS for Children, is proud to be offering a special pediatric CME series to pre-hospital providers of the Westchester EMS region. This series of symposiums, free to attendees, is funded by the Emergency Medical Services for Children Grant Award.
Courses tackle subjects vital to first responders, including Traumatic Brain Injury, Autism, Technology and Care of the Infant or Child, and Child Abuse/Neglect. The subject matter is presented by clinical experts from Blythedale Children’s Hospital, including physicians, nurses, therapists and other clinical experts.
“We are proud to partner with Westchester County Department of Emergency Services in providing this educational series to first responders, said Blythedale Children’s Hospital Chief Quality Officer Lois Allen. “It affords us the opportunity to share our wide-ranging expertise ,as well as to give back to the community in a way that can benefit a broad pediatric population.”
The programs are held on Tuesday evenings, with the next one -- Respiratory Challenges, presented by Blythedale Chief of Respiratory Therapy Dawn VanSickle -- on January 29th. The final program in the series, on Child Abuse, Neglect and Shaken Baby Syndrome, as well as Child and Infant Safety, will be presented by Blythedale Director of Social Work Susan Goodbody-Murray, and Blythedale/Westchester Safe Kids Coalition Coordinator Susan Larkin.
Classes run from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m., and are held at the Westchester County DES Training Center in Valhalla, NY. To register, for one of the remaining sessions, please email emsedu@westchestergov.com with your name, agency, certification, email and phone number.

About Blythedale Children’s Hospital
As New York’s only freestanding, specialty children’s hospital, Blythedale Children’s Hospital is dedicated to improving the health status and quality of life of children with complex medical illnesses and disabling conditions through superb multi-disciplinary patient care, teaching, research, and advocacy programs.  Blythedale’s board-certified physicians, nurses, and other clinical staff (social workers, respiratory therapists, clinical pharmacists, Child Life specialists, etc.) and New York State’s largest hospital-based pediatric therapy department (PT, OT and Speech) work together to provide intensive and innovative multi-disciplinary clinical and therapeutic care to help children achieve their medical and rehabilitative goals for independent living, and return to their communities.  Blythedale is also the only Hospital in New York State with its own, on-site public school district.  

For more information about Blythedale Children’s Hospital, visit http://www.blythedale.org.