Managing pediatric patients – children – medically is very different from managing adult patients. There are many adjustments made to the plan of care because children are physically and mentally immature, with dosages and treatments that are safe for adults aren’t safe for children. The same goes for cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and management – it’s very different for infants and children. This is where PALS (Pediatric Advanced Life Support) comes in.
PALS: Pediatric Advanced Life Support
The PALS program targets students who work in pediatric care environments, particularly allied health professionals who work in pediatric wards of hospitals and similar health care facilities. They are those who care for children and need to be prepared for pediatric emergencies. It takes 14 hours to complete (over two days) and costs 270 dollars.
Kelowna First Aid’s PALS program teaches students via scenarios, making it easier for them to recognize emergency situations when faced with them. While we focus on concepts and classroom-based learning, a large portion of training is skill-based. Expect to learn about the following basic and advanced skills and concepts in PALS training with us:
- Compressions, ventilations, and defibrillations for infants
- Compressions, ventilations, and defibrillations for younger children
- Pediatric pharmacology (cardiac medication)
- Intravenous access, intraosseous access, and fluid bolus administration
- Team dynamics in a code/resuscitation team
- One-person and two-person rescue
- Pediatric assessment
Note: Students are required to have a CPR Level C (Basic Life Support for Healthcare Providers) training credential before they can take an ALS program (ACLS and/or PALS). We offer CPR Level C training as well, which takes 4.5 hours to complete and costs 70 dollars.
PALS Training Certificate
Students receive their permanent training credentials several days after they pass the certification exams (a written and a skills test). It is valid for three years before it has to be renewed. You can sign up for our PALS refresher courses as well, if you want to renew your credentials for another three years.
Signing Up
Enrolling in our programs is really easy. There is a form below that you can fill out and submit online (just don’t forget to click the submit button). You may even enroll via e-mail or telephone call, whatever is most convenient for you. We also highly encourage prospective trainees to drop by in person, either to enroll or simply get to know our classes and curriculum better. The staff will be happy to assist you in anyway.
Getting started with training: Infant compressions
Compressions are not only categorized into adult and pediatric compressions. Infants are a special case, since their bodies are very small and immature. Too much force can easy cause rib fractures which can rupture their organs. Compressions for infants are performed by:
- Using two fingers, either both thumbs with hands encircling the torso or the pointer and middle fingers of one hand.
- Compress the chest by a third of the anterior-posterior diameter, which is usually an inch or less.
- One cycle is composed of 30 compressions and 2 ventilations.