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1995-03-16
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I've been a dead head since 1970 and a Rock Med volunteered since
1987. Working at 40 to 50 shows each year. About half of them DEAD Shows.
A few weeks ago there was an article in the San Jose Mercury News
about Rock Med and Dead-Heads. I've cleared it with the powers to be
to post it on the internet.
Thank You,
Bob Student voice 415-821-1635
Still crazybob@hooked.net after all these years.
-----------------------------------------------------------
SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS
Copyright 1995, San Jose Mercury News
DATE: Monday, March 6, 1995
PAGE: 1A EDITION: Morning Final
SECTION: Front LENGTH: 46 in. Long
ILLUSTRATION: Photos (3)
SOURCE: By BRAD KAVA, Mercury News Staff Writer
ROCK & ROLL DOCS
DEADHEADS ARE GRATEFUL FOR CONCERT MEDICAL TEAM
Joel, 23, a T-shirt designer from North Dakota, doesn't know how he
ended up on the floor of the Oakland Coliseum, naked, staring up at
five security officers at a recent Grateful Dead show.
He knows he took too much LSD. And he knows he tried to convince the
officers that a rock show was the right place to take off your clothes and
celebrate. He thought they were hauling him off to jail. Instead he
found himself lying on an inflatable mattress surrounded by tie-dyed
sheets -- in a room called ''the space station'' -- being soothed by
professional psychologists and doctors while his favorite rock band
played just outside the door. ''I owe my life to these guys,'' he
said the next day, clothed in drawstring pants and a tie-dyed shirt.
''That might have been the worst night of my life.''
These are the kinds of things Dr. George ''Skip'' Gay and his 600
fellow medical volunteers hear after many of the 250 concerts they
staff each year. They call themselves ''Rock Medicine,'' and since
1973, they have given free medical care and much more to concert goers
in the Bay Area and Sacramento.
They are like a ''M(*)A(*)S(*)H'' unit for those who are tripping --
and for those who trip and fall on their way to the shows.
At heavy metal concerts, where teen-age fans slam bodies and heads, the
Rock Medicine docs treat broken noses and worse. At Grateful Dead shows,
they encounter a variety of pharmaceutical cases. Rock Medicine has
made a national reputation among police and emergency room doctors by
efficiently and gently handling bad trippers. Its techniques have been
written up in medical journals.
Sometimes they joke that they are an HMO for ''Deadheads'' -- providing
otherwise unaffordable medical care for ''Tourheads,'' the gypsy-like fans
who follow the Grateful Dead from city to city.
They stitch and swab cuts and pay for cabs for some of those stranded
in parking lots after shows. They provide antibiotics for sore throats
and accompany a gangrene victim to the hospital for surgery. They treat
grandparents and babies for chest pains and flu, as well as those who have
too many drinks or overdose on drugs.
''We try to be non-judgmental,'' says Rock Medicine administrator Glen
Raswyck, the group's only paid worker.
''Our philosophy,'' he said, ''is to take care of the individual right
now and return him to his family and friends and do away with the necessity
of either hospitalizing him or getting him involved with the law.''
During the Grateful Dead's recent three-night Mardi Gras run,
40-year-old fan and artist Donnis Newman stopped in to have her finger
bandaged. ''I sliced the tip of my finger while I was cutting an
orange at home,'' she said, sitting with her hand on a medical table
surrounded by oxygen tanks, a heart defibrillator and a battered
surgical lamp. ''I could have gone to the hospital (before the
concert),'' she said, ''but I figured I'd go to *Rock*Med. *I totally
trust those guys, and I'd never used them for anything before but
earplugs and aspirin. I've always felt great knowing they were here.''
Wearing a brown Tibetan prayer hat and a badge identifying him as ''The
Eye Guy,'' San Francisco ophthalmologist Dr. Daniel Shainholz, 33, cleaned
and bandaged her wound. ''This is the ideal of medicine,'' Shainholz
said. ''You don't worry about paperwork: Are they insured? Are they an
HMO patient?'' ''It seems to the outside world being a physician
isn't in congress with being a Deadhead,'' added Shainholz, who says
he's a fan. ''Here I can have a professional relationship with people
and I don't have to pretend I don't have any interest in popular music.''
*Rock*Med* doctors feel they can let their hair down at the concerts.
The badge on Sonoma obstetrician Don Solomon, 51, reads ''At Your
Cervix.'' When Vallejo emergency medical technician Eric Elliot, 33, puts a
stethoscope to a patient's chest, there is a Deadhead logo on it.
At the recent weekend Dead shows, the doctors treated 37 people Friday,
35 Saturday and 45 Sunday, among the more than 15,000 attending each night.
In 12 hours that Sunday, doctors saw cuts on bare feet, bruises, a broken
arm, a split skull, exhaustion, a feverish baby and several bad LSD trips.
They wouldn't give an exact breakdown of what they treated because of
concerns for patient confidentiality, Raswyck said.
*Rock*Med* was started by Gay, 53, along with other members of the
Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic who were approached by the late promoter
Bill Graham. About 98 percent of the shows they work are produced by
the Bill Graham Presents organization. The promoter pays a fee to help
fund *Rock*Med's* $120,000 yearly budget. More money is raised
through donations. The Northern California doctors say they have
tried to spread the service to other states but have had trouble
finding physicians willing to volunteer their time for the shows.
Other promoters hire a few paramedics and have ambulances posted nearby
to take sick or injured fans to the hospital. Police in some cities handle
bad trips with handcuffs and jail. But a profusion of fans in drunk tanks
or emergency rooms can damage a promoter's business. Services are free
ade his way to the show at Shoreline Amphitheater. ''They took care
of me and got me back out there,'' Buxton said of the rock docs.
Eighty-four volunteers worked the Dead show on the recent Sunday night,
including nurses, paramedics and emergency medical technicians. They
wandered the Coliseum and parking lots with portable radios; like
walking ambulances, they can be dispatched quickly to medical problems.
At Dead shows the latest worry is nitrous oxide gas, which is consumed
by fans in the parking lots and sold in balloons. The gas is sometimes bought
from commercial rather than medical dealers, who sell it in canisters that
once held toxic gases. Even if the gas is from a clean container, it
can cause a user to pass out cold and hard.
LSD is also a problem. On this night, someone is selling mushrooms
laced with the drug and claiming it is gentler psilocybin. It's a bad trip.
''AARRGGHHH,'' yells one man who is brought into the clinic by security
guards, writhing. ''What's his name?'' asks a nurse. ''Just put
down AARRGGHH,'' says a doctor. Bare-chested, the man is thrashing
wildly, and it takes four people to hold him. The doctors say that
taking those on bad trips away from all the stimuli of the show is
calming and cuts down delusions. In extreme cases, the docs use
calming drugs. ''I like to respond to everything they say with
something that brings them back to the peaceful environment around
us,'' said Dr. David Relman, 38, a Stanford University professor and
microbiologist. ''I keep reminding them of where they are. I try to
provide a slice of reality.'' It works on the screaming man. He is
gone in time for the encore.
As in many hospitals, rock patients are given
handouts with information about their condition. ''Rock Medicine'' has a
special one -- on bright purple paper -- that is placed in the pockets of
patients coming off LSD. Here are some excerpts. Welcome back! You have
experienced what we call an Intense Psychedelic Reaction. Your behavior
included:
( ) Yelling incoherently and not responding to simple questions.
( ) Experiencing extreme fear or anxiety.
( ) Walking and/or running around without clothes.
( ) Violently refusing assistance, running away from security and/or
medical staff, trying to hit other patrons and/or security and/or medical
staff.
( ) Other
We treated you by:
( ) Keeping you in a safe place and talking to you in a calm,
reassuring manner.
( ) Restraining you with the arms, legs and body weight of our staff.
( ) Restraining you with padded ties.
( ) Injecting you with low doses of Ativan, which helps reduce anxiety,
and Haldol, which helps slow down hallucinations. . . . We do not
administer these medications unless the situation is so volatile that
there is danger of physical harm.
If your trip was particularly long and active, you may find you feel
tired, sore and have some bruises. Your physical exertion is the equivalent
of a workout lasting for some hours.
. . . While we can't say we hope you enjoyed your stay with us, we do
hope it was more agreeable than the probable alternatives -- involvement
with local law enforcement authorities (police, jail, court costs) or
emergency medical system (ambulance, hospital, psychiatric holds,
medical bills).
If you would like to support our efforts, we encourage you to send us a
tax-deductible donation.
Source: Rock Medicine
CAPTION: PHOTO: PATRICK TEHAN -- MERCURY NEWS A concertgoer high on
drugs is attended to by medical volunteers Michael O'Connell, left,
and Paul Sohn.
[950306 FR 10A color]
PHOTO: Photographs by PATRICK TEHAN -- MERCURY NEWS A Grateful Dead
symbol, left, appears on a stethoscope. [950306 FR 1A 2; color]
PHOTO: Photographs by PATRICK TEHAN -- MERCURY NEWS Below, a concertgoer
high on drugs is led to a treatment area. [950306 FR 1A 3; color]
KEYWORDS: MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL MUSIC SHOW
END OF DOCUMENT.
Fellow Dead Heads,
Rock Med has been treating Dead Heads for over 21 years
now, If you like to read more about Rock Med & Dead Heads
you'll have to write your story and e-mail it to me at
crazybob@hooked.net I've been a Dead Head since 1970 and
a Rock Med volunteer for over 7 years but I can't tell you
any Rock Med stories, 'cause all the Rock Med volunteers
take a secrecy oath not to talk about any of our patient,
however if you mail your story to me I'll put them
together and someday I upload them to the world.
- Still Crazy(Bob@get.Hooked.net) after all these years,
AKA Bob Student or Barf Bucket Bob
MARCH 15, 1995
For more information about Rock Med send a Stamped Self Address #10
Envelope with a few bucks if you got it
(checks to ROCK MED) to help us help others.
PLEASE NO PHONE CALLS we don't have any office staff!
Haight Ashbury Free Clinics
Rock Medicine - Info Please
3330 Geary Blvd. # 2FL W
San Francisco, CA 94118