Mission, Vision, History, & Educational Strategies
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Mission
WMTC's mission is to provide high-quality, practical courses, consultation, books, and supplies in wilderness medicine and outdoor program risk management.
Vision
WMTC's vision is to help create a world where outdoor trip leaders — both professional and private — have the medical and site management ability to prevent serious injury or death of those in their care.
History
The Wilderness Medicine Training Center was founded in 1997 by Paul Nicolazzo and incorporated in 2008 in Washington State. With over 35 years of experience leading trips and training trip leaders to function safely in challenging environments, Paul started WMTC because he believed there was a better way to effectively educate people in wilderness medicine and outdoor program risk management. Over the years and under his direction, WMTC has repeatedly proved this as we continue to develop new teaching strategies, materials, and curricula for today's outdoor professionals and recreationists. While we offer courses and ship supplies worldwide, our home office is in the heart of the North Cascades near the small towns of Mazama and Winthrop in Washington State.
Educational Philosophy
We base our medical course curriculum on the following concepts:
We believe that a clear understanding of wilderness medicine is required for effective site management and should be a part of a required training progression for all outdoor leaders and administrators. We believe a wilderness medicine course should increase each student's awareness of the potential problems inherent in a trip itinerary and provide enough education and insight to prevent most of them. At the same time, a course should teach the necessary assessment and treatment skills required to address the most severe problems should they arise.
We focus on providing practical instruction our students can understand, remember, and use. We strive to teach our students the information and skills to prevent, assess, and treat the most common injuries and illnesses they will likely encounter as expedition medical officers, guides, trip leaders, or participants. Our print and digital field manuals and patient notes provide invaluable resources for students during and after the course.
We use a proprietary mechanism of injury/illness (MOI) approach to differential diagnosis that helps students sort through the patient's signs and symptoms to reach an accurate diagnosis. Field assessment focuses on distinguishing between those injuries and illnesses that trip leaders may successfully treat in the field and those requiring urgent or non-urgent evacuation. Most injuries and illnesses in a wilderness environment result from minor traumatic incidents, a lack of awareness surrounding environmental hazards, and the minor medical issues often encountered during long expeditions (typically related to a lack of personal or group hygiene). There is a finite list of common traumatic and environmental problems, each with an easily identifiable clinical pattern, making them significantly easier to assess and treat than most medical problems. As such, we present material according to the MOI: trauma, environmental, and medical. We recognize that students are unlikely to remember all the material presented — especially those associated with complex medical MOI — and have developed a waterproof, tear-resistant field manual and digital handbook (app) for their phone or tablet and patient notes to assist them.
We teach normal anatomy and physiology before delving into the pathophysiology of a problem so that students gain a practical understanding of the problem and avoid a "grocery list" approach to assessment and treatment. Instructors use digital animations to visually illustrate complex concepts in physiology and pathophysiology in a manner students can understand and retain, and a full-sized skeleton and anatomical torso to help students develop a hands-on, three-dimensional understanding of the human body.
We use interactive case study reviews and realistic simulations to build motor skills and critical thinking. Retention and judgment are directly related to field experience; students acquire field experience through simulations, after-action analyses, and feedback. Medical professionals master their assessment and treatment skills via on-the-job training programs before acting independently. For most guides and trip leaders, the experience and after-action analysis required for mastery must happen within the context of their course if it is to occur before they are required to act on their own. Therefore, we believe an effective wilderness medicine course must contain enough case study review and simulation time to allow students to make, discuss, and learn from their mistakes under the practiced eye of an experienced instructor. Simulations in our WFR and WEMT courses are videotaped and reviewed to enhance learning. Critical thinking saves lives. We teach critical thinking.
We base our medical curriculum on practice guidelines published by the Wilderness Medical Society and the certification standards developed by the Wilderness Medicine Education Collaborative (WMEC) for WFA, WAFA, and WFR courses. The collaborative consists of directors from the major wilderness medicine schools in the United States and assures our students receive the most current peer-reviewed information. WMTC's director is an active member of the WMEC.
We believe outdoor leaders should be taught by professional outdoor leaders and educators with medical training and field experience rather than medical professionals with no professional or minimal outdoor experience. Time spent outdoors leading private and professional trips develops leadership and judgment, which are essential to making sound medical and evacuation decisions.
We believe instructors should tailor the depth of anatomy, physiology, pathophysiology, and delivery methods to meet the specific needs of each class. We realize that students with varying academic abilities will require different levels of background anatomy, physiology, and pathophysiology. WMTC's 18-day Instructor Training Course and follow-up apprenticeship train instructors to work with varying students of different academic backgrounds. Simulation "stories" are built by combining the student's outdoor activities — as expressed during the course introduction — and real-life incidents, the actual environmental conditions during the course, and the site constraints.
We believe that a clear understanding of wilderness medicine is required for effective site management and should be a part of a required training progression for all outdoor leaders and administrators. We believe a wilderness medicine course should increase each student's awareness of the potential problems inherent in a trip itinerary and provide enough education and insight to prevent most of them. At the same time, a course should teach the necessary assessment and treatment skills required to address the most severe problems should they arise.
We focus on providing practical instruction our students can understand, remember, and use. We strive to teach our students the information and skills to prevent, assess, and treat the most common injuries and illnesses they will likely encounter as expedition medical officers, guides, trip leaders, or participants. Our print and digital field manuals and patient notes provide invaluable resources for students during and after the course.
We use a proprietary mechanism of injury/illness (MOI) approach to differential diagnosis that helps students sort through the patient's signs and symptoms to reach an accurate diagnosis. Field assessment focuses on distinguishing between those injuries and illnesses that trip leaders may successfully treat in the field and those requiring urgent or non-urgent evacuation. Most injuries and illnesses in a wilderness environment result from minor traumatic incidents, a lack of awareness surrounding environmental hazards, and the minor medical issues often encountered during long expeditions (typically related to a lack of personal or group hygiene). There is a finite list of common traumatic and environmental problems, each with an easily identifiable clinical pattern, making them significantly easier to assess and treat than most medical problems. As such, we present material according to the MOI: trauma, environmental, and medical. We recognize that students are unlikely to remember all the material presented — especially those associated with complex medical MOI — and have developed a waterproof, tear-resistant field manual and digital handbook (app) for their phone or tablet and patient notes to assist them.
We teach normal anatomy and physiology before delving into the pathophysiology of a problem so that students gain a practical understanding of the problem and avoid a "grocery list" approach to assessment and treatment. Instructors use digital animations to visually illustrate complex concepts in physiology and pathophysiology in a manner students can understand and retain, and a full-sized skeleton and anatomical torso to help students develop a hands-on, three-dimensional understanding of the human body.
We use interactive case study reviews and realistic simulations to build motor skills and critical thinking. Retention and judgment are directly related to field experience; students acquire field experience through simulations, after-action analyses, and feedback. Medical professionals master their assessment and treatment skills via on-the-job training programs before acting independently. For most guides and trip leaders, the experience and after-action analysis required for mastery must happen within the context of their course if it is to occur before they are required to act on their own. Therefore, we believe an effective wilderness medicine course must contain enough case study review and simulation time to allow students to make, discuss, and learn from their mistakes under the practiced eye of an experienced instructor. Simulations in our WFR and WEMT courses are videotaped and reviewed to enhance learning. Critical thinking saves lives. We teach critical thinking.
We base our medical curriculum on practice guidelines published by the Wilderness Medical Society and the certification standards developed by the Wilderness Medicine Education Collaborative (WMEC) for WFA, WAFA, and WFR courses. The collaborative consists of directors from the major wilderness medicine schools in the United States and assures our students receive the most current peer-reviewed information. WMTC's director is an active member of the WMEC.
We believe outdoor leaders should be taught by professional outdoor leaders and educators with medical training and field experience rather than medical professionals with no professional or minimal outdoor experience. Time spent outdoors leading private and professional trips develops leadership and judgment, which are essential to making sound medical and evacuation decisions.
We believe instructors should tailor the depth of anatomy, physiology, pathophysiology, and delivery methods to meet the specific needs of each class. We realize that students with varying academic abilities will require different levels of background anatomy, physiology, and pathophysiology. WMTC's 18-day Instructor Training Course and follow-up apprenticeship train instructors to work with varying students of different academic backgrounds. Simulation "stories" are built by combining the student's outdoor activities — as expressed during the course introduction — and real-life incidents, the actual environmental conditions during the course, and the site constraints.
We base our risk management courses on the following concepts:
We divide outdoor program risk management into incident prevention and incident response. We believe that outdoor companies should focus on incident prevention without ignoring incident response — and that training and accurate assessment of staff at all levels of the organization is critical to effective incident prevention.
We believe that on the macro level, program and course safety depends on the ability of the administration to balance the risk inherent in the program design with the competency of the field staff.
We believe that on the micro level, course and activity safety depend on the site management ability of the field staff. WMTC site management concepts and theory are proprietary and protected by trademark.
We believe that on the macro level, program and course safety depends on the ability of the administration to balance the risk inherent in the program design with the competency of the field staff.
We believe that on the micro level, course and activity safety depend on the site management ability of the field staff. WMTC site management concepts and theory are proprietary and protected by trademark.
