CHEYENNE — Yvonne Neuenschwander will be recognized with the Lifetime Achievement Award on the Wyoming State Trauma Conference in Cheyenne on Aug. 25.

This award is given, at most, once annually to a person who has dedicated his or herself to making a positive force in the state’s Emergency Medical Services.

Neuenschwander has served as an EMT in Bridger Valley for over 43 years. She took the EMT course in the spring of 1974, and that fall helped start the local ambulance service. Not long after, she became the director of the Bridger Valley Ambulance Service and served in that capacity for a number of years. She guided its growth from one used, hand-me-down white van to the full ACLS service it is today.

Neuenschwander was born in Afton, grew up in Freedon and earned her RN from the LDS School of Nursing. When she and her husband, Larry, moved to Lyman, there were no medical services available, not even a clinic. If people needed help, they would go to Neuenschwander’s house or one of the other three RNs who lived in Bridger Valley. It was this need for medical services that led her to help with the formation of the ambulance service.

Even though she is an RN and can run on the ambulance under that license, Neuenschwander has taken all of the EMT classes and still maintains her EMS license. In addition to dedication to the service, she worked full-time as a school nurse in Lyman. Earlier this year, she and several other long-time EMTs were recognized as Lyman” Persons of the Year.

Pictured:

Yvonne Neuenschwander is pictured with State EMS Director Andy Gienapp and the plaque she received, “Lifetime Achievement Award,” at the Wyoming State Trauma Conference in Cheyenne on Aug. 25.

COURTESY PHOTO/Eric Quinney