Laughing gas eases suffering

STOWE, Vt. — Normally used in dentist’s offices and hospitals, nitrous oxide — yes, laughing gas — is starting to turn up again in ambulances in some rural areas where medical workers with clearance to provide more traditional painkillers often aren’t on board.

It gives advanced emergency medical technicians, who are a step down from higher-level paramedics, a way to help relieve patients’ pain and anxiety on what can sometimes be long trips to a hospital.

“For someone to be in pain for that extended period of time, you know we want to try to ease that,” said Scott Brinkman, chief of emergency medical services in Stowe, a ski resort town that sees many related injuries and started using nitrous a year ago.

Nitrous oxide equipment has been sold to ambulance crews in at least 30 states in the past three years, including Maine, New York, North Dakota, Oregon, Texas and Wisconsin, according to Henry Schein Medical, the sole distributor of the version for ambulances.

Nitrous has been more commonly used in ambulances in Europe and Australia.

It is also not an opioid, a bonus as the country grapples with a drug crisis.

In Stowe, for example, a woman who dislocated her shoulder asked not to be given narcotics because she was recovering from addiction, Brinkman said.

Nitrous oxide is delivered by breathing through a mask or tube that the patient holds so they can regulate the dose.