Medical response manager Zack Octavio lends a hand after kids are hurt By PAT JENKINS TGI Editor Zack Octavio feels the pain of parents of injured Pop Warner football players. “You can see the worry on their faces,” even though
Medical response manager Zack Octavio lends a hand after kids are
hurt
By PAT JENKINS
TGI Editor
Zack Octavio feels the
pain of parents of injured Pop Warner football players.
“You can see the
worry on their faces,” even though their young gridders usually aren’t
seriously hurt, said Octavio, who is one of the first people at their side in
his role as a volunteer medic at each Pop Warner game on Kaua’i throughout the
season.
Knowing that a full-fledged paramedic is on the sidelines “helps
put the parents in their comfort zone,” said Octavio, who manages American
Medical Response on Kaua’i.
He knows how the parents feel. Once, during the
15 years he has volunteered, Octavio had to tend to his own son who broke his
arm in a game.
“That was the worst injury he’s had in organized football,”
said Octavio, whose son now is a placekicker for College of the Siskiyous in
northern California.
Most of the injuries suffered by aspiring players in
Pop Warner are limited to bruises and sprains. Octavio, who didn’t play
football competitively (“I grew up in a farming family and didn’t have time for
it”), said there are occasional fractures and mild concussions (“Those are the
scariest”), plus “one or two” possible neck injuries that are initially treated
as such because of their potential seriousness but thankfully turn out to be
false alarms.
“Football is a full-contact sport, so there are going to be
injuries,” he said. “The severity of injuries has decreased considerably,
though. Players are getting stronger and faster, but there are good safety
rules and equipment.”
Still, having Octavio around makes parents feel
better about the safety of their young football heroes, said Gina Ramson, who
has two sons on Pop Warner teams.
“He’s awesome,” Ramson said. “He’s out
there every weekend. The (game) announcer always asks us to give him a hand for
being there, but I don’t think that’s enough thanks for what he’s
doing.”
Editor Pat Jenkins can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 227) and
pjenkins@pulitzer.net
Staff Photo by Dennis Fujimoto,
Staff
american medical response island manager Zack Octavio (middle,
kneeling), updates the coaching staffs of the Lihu’e and Northshore Pee Wee
teams as to the condition of a fallen player. Octavio has been volunteering for
Pop Warner for the past 15 years.
