Firefighters recognized for burn care efforts

By Brian Hayes, Staff Reporter, Halifax Herald

For over 15 years, Nova Scotia Firefighters have raised more than $ 1 million in support of burn care and education.

The effort began in 1983, when three Halifax firefighters decided they wanted to contribute to the fight against burn injuries. Since then, the Nova Scotia Firefighters' Burn Treatment Society has become Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre's second largest charity.

To recognize this accomplishment, the society's name is engraved on the centre's wall of honour, and the burn unit at the Victoria General Hospital site is now called the Nova Scotia Firefighters' Burn Care Centre.

"Their work has made a tremendous contribution to patients, their families, and staff,"said Nora-Gene Goodwin, VG's burn care centre nurse manager.

" The society has purchased equipment and funded educational opportunities," she said of a burn support group that links burn survivors and others with the Burn Nurses Association,a national group.

"It's an excellent demonstration of partnership with the community,"she said.

Ms. Goodwin mentioned the skin bank the society established at the hospital in 1986 and the equipment and specialized training needed to operate it. It's the only skin bank east of Montreal and only one of two operating in Canada at the time.

Funding burn units at the VG for adults and one at the IWK Grace Health Centre for children, the society also raises money to promote burn-prevention education and help with treatment of burn survivors.

It donated $25,000 to the municipality to establish a school program and launched another project aimed at young arsonists.

"Funds are used to promote burn-prevention education and to assist in the treatment of burn victims." said society chairman Lt. Dave Collier, a firefighter with the Department of National Defence.

At the IWK hospital, the society helps provide advanced training for staff who work with burn victims, he said.

The society is composed of firefighters from Amherst to Yarmouth, including members of the DND fire service and corporate representatives.

From its first fund-raiser, a hotdog sale that netted $1,100 over two days, the society's flagship event is now an annual bowl-a-thon that draws teams of firefighters from across the province.

"Last year we raised $46,000," Mr. Collier said.

The same year, the society hosted its first summer camp for adult and young burn survivors.

"Child burn survivors can bring out the best in the adults," he said."The reverse is also true."

Volunteer firefighters, nurses, doctors and other organized activities similar to those at other summer camps. Twenty-five campers attended this year.

On late September, Mr. Collier escorted a young New Brunswick teenage burn survivor to a International Firefighters' Association sponsored camp in Washington, D.C.

Sherry Carruthers of Fredericton has undergone two dozen operations at the IWK after being scalded with boiling water when she was 14 months old. She received second and third degree burns to almost half her body, mostly her back, arms and legs.

Sherry was one of four young Canadians invited to attend the camp, along with American burn survivors. For a week the group toured the capital, visiting the Smithsonian Institution, White House and historical monuments. Along the way, they met with Vice President Al Gore.

"It was an emotional experience for me just listening to kids opening up to one another about their situations," Mr. Collier said.

And the kids had such a good time that it wasn't long "before their scars no longer became an issue," he said.

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Last updated Monday, April 01, 2002