Distance Learning

Paramedic studies health sciences while working in the Middle East

When James Moore, a health sciences student in the University of Mississippi Medical Center’s School of Health Related Professions, ordered his textbooks earlier this month, he feared he might not be able to get them before the fall semester began. The reason: Election Day in Afghanistan.

Living in off-base housing in the capital of Kabul, Moore asked his advisor in mid-August if his professors could e-mail him some assignments ahead of time so that he could try to keep up.

“We are locked down until at least the 22(nd) of August depending on insurgent attacks and political unrest,” he wrote to Dr. Javis Knott earlier this month, adding that he wouldn’t be able to reach the post office on the military base until Aug. 24.

A native of Grenada, Moore is often asked which branch of the military he serves in, and he is quick to point out that he’s just a civilian – a civilian with “itchy feet” who loves working overseas.

“My primary job is a remote paramedic, but here I fill many roles which I have not in past remote-war-zone jobs,” he said.

Moore currently works for a private security contract company on a government-funded humanitarian program to remove landmines and other munitions that have contaminated Afghanistan dating back to the Soviet invasion of 1979.

“I help train our team workers in several sites all over the country,” Moore explained. “I train them for basic first aid and CPR as well as for more common basics and care.”

He also is certified as an advanced dive medic and has more than 300 hours of training as a hyperbaric chamber technician, skills he continues to develop during his yearly trips to Honduras.

By the time Moore graduated from UMMC’s Paramedic Program in 1994, he’d already gotten the travel bug.

He spent some years working at a ski resort in Colorado and on an ambulance in Starkville before serving as a medic on offshore oil rigs and seismic vessels.

But it was the U.S. invasion of Iraq in March 2003 that inspired him to look for work in the Middle East.

“When they started dropping bombs, I began looking for companies that would be hiring medics,” said Moore. “I was interested in the issues and support of our troops and contractors over in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

He was hired by engineering and construction company KBR, at the time a subsidiary of Halliburton, and quickly found himself deployed to Kuwait. For two years he traveled around Iraq, setting up several clinics from Baghdad to Mosul.

From there, work on oil platforms took him to the west coast ofAfrica and to Indonesia before he landed the job in Afghanistanin late 2007.

Amid all of the travel to exotic locales around the globe, Moore plans regular vacations with his two children, daughter Abby, who lives in Pennsylvania, and son Vas, who lives in Batesville. He says his work is flexible enough to allow him to plan for time off when his kids are out of school for holidays or summer break. This summer, he took them to Disney World and Space Camp in Huntsville, Ala.

“It’s definitely a lifestyle and something that gets into your blood,” he said. “I can take my vacations when I want to.”

Afghanistan held its presidential election on Aug. 20, despite attacks by Taliban insurgents aimed at suppressing voter turnout.

Confined to a fortified house with other members of his team, Moore learned that his semester was scheduled to begin a week later than he originally expected, giving him time to get his textbooks.

He’s taking two classes this semester – his third semester in theprogram.

Knott, director of the Health Sciences Program, is Moore’s academic advisor and also taught the student in a couple of classes over the last two semesters. He said Moore originally contacted him last summer to ask about the program and whether he’d be allowed to take classes from abroad.

“I told him we would be happy to work with him as long as he felt that he could keep up with the workload,” Knott said.

The Health Sciences program targets people who work in a health-care related field and offers them a bachelor of science degree. The program is flexible and all classes are online, Knott said.

As a student, Knox describes Moore as extremely self-disciplined.

“He’s definitely a leader,” Knott said, “but he’s so modest he doesn’t even realize it.”

Once his degree is complete and his work in Afghanistan is finished, Moore said he might enroll in a physician assistant program and someday might pursue more of a teaching role.

“Once I get my degree I’ll go from there,” he said.

-Matt Westerfield

2009-09-02 00:00:00 18977