Hours after the New Jersey State Police’s Southstar rescue helicopt er in Atlantic County was first equipped with capacity to do blood transfusions in the field, it was dispatched to a nearby motorcycle crash where a rider was losing blood fast.
The team arrived in less than nine minutes, according to state officials, and was able to quickly administer blood to the injured rider on scene, long before they could get him to the emergency room. Doctors involved said that fast response probably saved his life.
“We’ve known for a while in medicine that what someone who is having severe trauma, who is bleeding to death — what they really need is blood,” said Dr. Timothy Satty, director of emergency services at Newark’s University Hospital…