The initiative took flight after Dr. Aaron Ziegler learned of a local incident.
“I had a colleague whose husband is a canine handler, and their canine was critically injured during the course of apprehending a suspect. They ended up taking that patient to a local emergency vet but were told they needed to go to Michigan State University's vet clinic.”
After learning Michigan law allows emergency medical teams to transport injured K9s, Ziegler, Medical Director of Corewell Health Aero Med, partnered with MSU’s Veterinary Medical Center, training flight crews to adapt their lifesaving skills.
“The same IVs that we would put in a human, we can put in a dog. The same breathing tubes that we put in a human, we can put in a dog. Again, there's a few just minor physiological differences but really the majority of our training on humans is fairly applicable to the canines.”
The dogs can cost $30,000 or more to train and they face threats from traffic crashes, physical assaults, heatstroke and illicit drug exposure.
Under the new protocol, when a K9 is injured, an alert goes out preparing the East Lansing veterinary team to receive it.
New in-flight safety measures have been implemented.
“These canines are going to be scared and injured, and there's the potential that they could injure our crew, so the canine handler also has to go with us. They would muzzle the patient - the canine - if they're conscious, and then we would start rendering the life-saving temporizing care until we can get to the MSU vet clinic.”
Corewell and partner Munson Healthcare are providing air transport at no cost to police agencies, backed by a public MSU donation to cover veterinary costs.
Learn more about the program at the Michigan State University Veterinary Medical Center website page.
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