Frontier

As a freshman in high school I went to Young Life Camp in Colorado. It was incredible. One of the best and most memorable weeks of my life.

In college I went back to Frontier Ranch to volunteer as a life guard for a month. Even better. My love affair with the mountains began and has never ended. I am not a "outdoorsy" girl. I like sheets, beds, and hot tubs but Frontier Ranch brings out my Patagonia side.

For 3 years the Strader's have gone to Frontier Ranch where Bryan volunteers as camp physician. They put us up in a lovely wood cabin furnished like a lovely hotel. There is no TV,Internet, or phone service. I go stir crazy for about 24 hours then I begin to relax like I've never been able to relax on any other vacation. All our meals are prepared and served to us. Our cabin is cleaned daily, and quite honestly they pamper us. There is nothing like a late night hot tub soak under the Colorado stars.

So...... We leave on Sunday at 0630. I've been packing all day and the whole family is ready to roll. About 5 minutes ago I received an email from the camp that stated the following......

To Frontier Camp doctors

Recent Illness at Frontier:

For each of the past 2 weeks we have had a camper arrive with what ended up being H1N1 influenza documented by the Colorado Public Health Department. They were asymptomatic on arrival—in fact the second week we took the temperature of every camper on the buses prior to entering the camp. The first week the index patient became symptomatic Wed night. Despite initiating screening and isolation of symptomatic kids, we ended up having 60 ill campers and staff residing in the Kiva. The second week the index patient became symptomatic on Tuesday night and was isolated literally 8 hours after becoming ill, within one hour of telling his leader. Despite aggressive isolation and surveillance, we still ended up with 15 ill campers and staff, with every area represented. Basically the entire camp was exposed. Because of such widespread illness and exposure, camp was prematurely ended on Day 5.

Recommendations:

Point of origin screening: a doctor/nurse will screen every camper embarking for Frontier, including taking a temperature of every camper.

Arrival: any group in transit over 12 hours will be rescreened including taking temperatures prior to entering the camp. If a camper is identified as symptomatic (temperature greater than or equal to 100.4), the sick camper will be isolated and the entire group will be kept separate.

Screening process: fever greater than 100.4. Flu-like symptoms: fever, body aches, sore throat, cough, headache. I immediately isolated all febrile campers and all campers with the constellation of flu-like symptoms with or without fever.

Treatment: If you do encounter this, send the first camper to a clinic or hospital for formal influenza testing so that you’ll have a definitive diagnosis from which to act. Additional campers with similar illness do not need testing. Use tamiflu only for high risk patients (asthma, immuno- compromise, etc). Provide tamiflu prophylaxis sparingly as well.

Clearance: Release ill campers after a full 24 hours being asymptomatic.

If you have any questions, feel free to call me.

M.C. (Cub) Culbertson, III, M.D.

Bryan is freaking out, I am laughing, and it is so typical of us. We can't go and relax, the stupid Swine Flu has invaded Colorado. We will keep you posted!!