Emergency Medical Trailers on Display

When the next major disaster hits, Ventura County will be better prepared, with three new mobile emergency trailers packed full of medical supplies that county public health officials plan to show off today in Ventura.

Funded by the Commission on Human Concerns and the Medtrans ambulance company, the trailers will be on display outside the Ventura County Courthouse today from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Ambulance and fire companies could tow or fly any of the triage trailers to the scene of a major medical emergency to supply fresh bandages and other first-aid gear to emergency workers, said Barbara Brodfuehrer, the county’s emergency medical services administrator.

“It’s for disastrous situations, and that would include things like multicasualty accidents that have quite a few victims, where all the supplies on ambulances are used up, or in a situation like an earthquake,” she said. “It’ll help a little bit in relieving the load at emergency rooms.”

The trailers--to be stationed at firehouses in Simi Valley, Piru and Fillmore, carry enough medical supplies to treat up to 10 patients and stabilize their condition so they can be moved to a hospital, she said.

Among the supplies in each trailer: eight wooden backboards, 20 splints, 18 cervical collars and 10 disposable blankets, plus a large assortment of bandages, cloth tape and trauma dressings.

Two similar trailers have been in place at ambulance companies in Thousand Oaks and Oxnard since 1989, when county health officials conceived the idea, Brodfuehrer said.

The trailers are meant to back up ambulances, fire department medical teams and the county public health department’s disaster response vehicle, a mobile medical clinic and communications center that can be moved to the scene of any emergency.