Liberty Ambulance Come Together to Save a Life

Thursday, September 24, 2020, RIDGECREST, Calif. - Friday September 11th is a day that Delilah Padgett will never forget. Early that morning several blockages in her coronary arteries blocked adequate blood flow to her heart, creating a life threatening arrhythmia that if left untreated could have killed her. When Delilah became extremely dizzy and fell her family dialed 9-1-1 and within minutes Kern County Fire Department Engine 74 and RRH/Liberty EMS Paramedic Rescue 2 arrived. The First Responders working together quickly assessed the patient and a new EKG monitor recently implemented in all Liberty Ambulance Paramedic Rescues confirmed the patient was having a STEMI – (ST-Elevation Myocardial Infarction), a serious type of heart attack, which is potentially fatal.

Based upon the confirmation of a STEMI and the patient’s medical history the decision was made to fly the patient to the closest STEMI center in Lancaster. Mercy Air 14 was notified and the patient was transported to the helipad at Ridgecrest Regional Hospital. The flight crew of Mercy Air 14 took over patient care and the patient was flown to Antelope Valley Hospital where a special STEMI team was awaiting her arrival.

Today, Delilah is home and recovering from her life threatening episode. “By sharing stories like this, our hope is that the general public will understand how much training and preparation the EMS providers invest so that make cases such as this a success” stated Erin Cocciolone, RRH/Liberty Ambulance’s Director of EMS Operations.

About Ridgecrest Regional Hospital

Ridgecrest Regional Hospital is a nonprofit, full service, acute care hospital, accredited by DNV Healthcare, with 980 employees. It is a 196 bed facility, including 25 inpatient and 99 Skilled Nursing Facility beds. Located in Ridgecrest, California, it was founded in 1945 by Dr. Thomas A. Drummond, who realized the need for medical care, to support the then recently established Naval Ordnance Test Station. Today, RRH continues as the only regional healthcare system providing a variety of services to the rural communities of the Southern Sierra. Our Vision is to be a leader with other healthcare providers in offering the highest quality, patient-centered, affordable healthcare and wellness services to the people of our service area.

The RRH health system offers multi-specialty healthcare and state-of-the-art facilities, including Gastroenterology Lab, Cardiology, Dermatology, Orthopedics, Pediatrics and an accredited Sleep Lab, to name a few. The hospital also offers a Cancer Center, as part of an ongoing oncology affiliation with UC Davis Health Cancer Care Network, and is one of only a number of hospitals across the country to install FDA-approved state-of-the-art automated breast screening ultrasound technology in the Women’s Imaging Department, clinically proven to increase cancer detection by 35.7 percent. The hospital has been awarded the ACR (American College of Radiology) gold seal of accreditation in Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, representing the highest level of image quality and patient safety and the Emergency Department has been designated by Kern County Public Health, as a Level IV trauma center, providing stabilization and advanced trauma life support.

Future plans include a new Emergency Room, new helipad for air ambulance services. For more information, visit us at: rrh.org/, Facebook.com/RidgecrestRegionalHospital and Instagram @ridgecrestregionalhospital.