Survival Flight Outreach and Education

Flight Nurse Commitment to Clinical Practice

The flight nurse position offers many benefits to the nurse who is hired, but also offers opportunity for responsibility and accountability beyond that of traditional nursing positions within Michigan Medicine.

In addition to scheduled shifts, it is the responsibility of the flight nurse to maintain all certifications and credits necessary to maintain these certifications. This includes but is not limited to: RN, EMT-P, CCRN, CEN,  CFRN; BCLS, ACLS, PALS, NRP, ABLS, and TNATC or ATLS. This requires significant time dedicated to Survival Flight.

Likewise, staff are immersed in education and clinical practice through recurrent education modules, eclipsing the entire patient population that Survival Flight transports; and maintenance of various invasive skills such as surgical airways, chest tube placement and placement of central venous and arterial lines.

Survival Flight also has a very robust simulation curriculum. Case review, recurrent education, competencies and skills maintenance utilize the latest in high-fidelity human patient simulation (HPS) technology.

Initial and recurrent education is strenuous because the job is strenuous. Survival Flight nursing staff work incessantly in order to stay at the cutting edge of the air medical community with respect to clinical practice. As clinical representatives of the University of Michigan, we must employ the same practice standards and medical technologies that bring patients from across the state, as well as from across the country. Those that we serve expect nothing less.

We are proud of the training our nurses undergo, including surgical skills lab. Michigan Medicine statement on the use of animals to train Survival Flight personnel

Outreach Education

Survival Flight is equally committed to providing education to those that we consider our partners in healthcare. This is evidenced by our busy schedule of landing zone courses, conferences (now up to 3 per year),  While not all inclusive, the aforementioned activities show our commitment to those that we serve next to on a daily basis. For more information on any of these activities and offerings, click on the appropriate link in the left-hand column.

Regional Landing Zone Classes (TBA)

Survival Flight is dedicated to providing education to our partners in the community. We provide landing zone classes to Fire, Police and EMS agencies with the goal to maximize safety during scene operations. We discuss how to set up a safe landing zone and ways to avoid certain hazards. Once the classroom portion is completed and a landing zone has been properly constructed, an available Survival Flight helicopter will land.
Due to the large number of Landing Zone Class requests, we are proud to offer our new Regional Landing Zone Class. We are working with Fire Departments to reach out to neighboring agencies in order to reach as many agencies as possible. CEUs are available.