Saturday, a terrified mother ran up to me, begging for Benadryl. Her 12 year old son had been stung by a bee (they were unaware of this allergy, so didn't have an epi-pen), and his reaction was immediate: severe swelling of his face, neck, torso, and arms, profuse sweating, fever, and what appeared to be uncontrollable twitching, which it turned out was due to severe itching all over his body. I didn't have any Benadryl (and would not have been allowed to administer it if I did have it, although I suppose I could have "accidentally" left some on the picnic table nearby...), but did call for an ambulance, and had the kid brought over to my motor home for observation. Fortunately, it was a moderate, rather than severe, allergy, and his throat didn't close up and he continued to breathe, and remained responsive.
It took more than 30 minutes for a fire truck to arrive, and the occupants did nothing more than take his blood pressure, and berate us for not having Benadryl on hand (of course THEY didn't have any either). The ambulance arrived 10 minutes later, loaded him into the ambulance, and treated him while waiting for Life Flight to arrive. 10-15 minutes after the ambulance, Life Flight was finally overhead, but with the tree cover up here it was unable to land. They drove the kid back down the road several miles (it takes nearly 20 minutes to travel 4 miles on this steep, narrow, winding road) to an opening in the trees.
That's as much as I know about his particular case, but it leaves me a little fearful about the chances of survival in a real emergency. Rattlesnake bites, severe allergies, heart attacks, and other injuries are distinct possibilities here. While I can perform CPR, and treat some pretty bad injuries, there's nothing I can do about rattlesnake bites or anaphylactic shock. The hospital is an hour away from here, so driving isn't a better option. I never fully appreciated the logistics of emergency response in these remote areas.
