Michelle Bowman, ARC/GNY Assistant Director of Training and Logistics, writes about her historic trip to Israel to work as an MDA Ambulance Responder.

By the middle of our second week, we felt fairly comfortable in our role as MDA volunteers. Although we still had a lot to learn, and we needed a lot more practice, we had a general sense of what we should be doing throughout the day. And we had learned the most important lesson—the success of your day depended heavily on your choice of a driver.

We are working the morning shift at MDA, which means that our day runs from 7am to 3pm. For this reason, the majority of our drivers are paid, but we have run across a few scattered volunteers as well. We are slowly getting to know the paid drivers, many of whom work three to five shifts per week. While all the drivers are good, they all have very different styles of work and interaction with volunteers.

Some of the drivers love having volunteers. Volunteers are generally eager to help, so they take vital signs (blood pressure, pulse, and breathing), fill out the forms, fold the bed, replace the sheets, clean the ambulance, and (perhaps most importantly) help carry patients up and down stairs. It would be nearly impossible for a driver to successfully operate without the help of at least one volunteer.

That said, drivers have seen many volunteers come and go over the years. Most volunteers are tentative when they first start working in the ambulance and they need some training. Although most drivers are happy to help the new volunteers, some have just grown tired of working with a constantly evolving flow of new people. These drivers can be slightly less friendly to new volunteers, and tend to just ignore the extra people in the back of their ambulance.

As non-Hebrew speakers, we have some additional considerations when choosing a driver. First, we quickly learned to request English-speaking drivers when we are speaking with the scheduler in the morning. Second, we always like to make sure that there is another Hebrew-speaking volunteer on the ambulance so that they can fill out the multiple forms that have to be completed for each patient. One day this week, Francis, Paul, and Kathryn all went out on the same ambulance. Although Kathryn quite quickly learned how to copy Hebrew information from the ID card to the form, I think the driver missed having someone who could complete the entire form.

We have heard from more experienced volunteers that the objective is to gain a regular driver, someone you can go out with on a regular basis. This way, you can learn your driver's quirks and develop a relationship. Right now, as we work with different drivers, we are trying to find someone who will enjoy working with us over the next five weeks. We"ve had varying degrees of success, but we’ve all found some drivers that we enjoy. Hopefully we will quickly find drivers who enjoy working with us as well.

In addition to navigating the MDA politics, we are also continuing to have new, fascinating experiences. This week Kathryn became the first Red Cross volunteer to see a CPR. Apparently it was an elderly woman, and she was not able to actually do CPR because an Intensive Care Unit arrived very quickly. Nonetheless, the rest of us were very impressed.

We have also seen all different areas in Jerusalem. On Wednesday I had the opportunity to go to a call in East Jerusalem, a predominately Arab neighborhood. We were responding to a call about a man who had fallen. My driver was not entirely familiar with the area, so we drove carefully through the small winding streets until a large group of Arab children flagged us down and pointed us down a tiny alley that led to the patient’s house. As we walked, carrying a backboard, an oxygen tank, a couple of neckbraces, a bag full of medical supplies, and pushing a stretcher, the group of children around us grew larger and larger. Inside, while the driver checked the patient, I had the opportunity to discretely survey a typical Arab home. It was a fascinating experience, and something that the average American tourist very rarely has the chance to see.

Of course, not all of our calls are that interesting. In fact, some can be downright gross. While working on the basic ambulance, you are sometimes called to pick up a patient from one of the intensive care ambulances, so that that the mobile ICU does not have to spend valuable time bringing patients to the hospital. Supposedly only the less critical patients are transferred, but sometimes standards become more flexible on busy days. One day this week, we drove up to a mobile ICU and found a very elderly man who was entirely non-responsive. Moreover, the last hospital he was at supposedly had just given him a laxative and the smell was horrible. It was the longest car trip of my life. I intently watched the man’s chest rise and fall, terrified that he would die on the way to the hospital. At the same time, I was trying to take small breaths myself so that I would not be overwhelmed by the smell.

I was unbelievably relieved when we arrived at the hospital without incident. However, as I stood in the emergency room, holding the man’s stretcher, I saw an entirely different side of the patient. His wife stood next to the stretcher, holding her unresponsive husband’s man. Suddenly the patient became more than a sick man—he became a husband, a father, and a grandfather. The scene was moving.

I have found that you frequently have to put aside your personal feelings while working on an ambulance. You simply see too much sickness; if you felt empathy for all of the patients, you could not continue working. However, sometimes when a sick woman grabs your hand for support, or when you watch relatives worry about their loved ones, it is hard to remain professional. Every day we struggle to maintain the appropriate balance between dehumanizing the patients and becoming overly involved. And I think all of us have felt the urge to call our own parents and grandparents over the last week and a half.