Dear Answer Man, I love your column. Thanks for the information and the laughs. I will try not to bore you with a silly question.

Are all high schools required to have an ambulance at football games? Last week during the Rochester John Marshall versus Lakeville North high school football game, played at Lakeville North, a JM player was injured and knocked unconscious. This young man lay motionless for several minutes with a team of people trying to help while 911 was dispatched. It took more than 20 minutes to get an ambulance there. I have been to a lot of football games and can't remember NOT seeing an ambulance. -- A.D.

There's no requirement to have an ambulance at football games or other sports events, according to the Minnesota State High School League, but there's an expectation that the schools are prepared to act fast.

"Every school does it a little differently," based in part on how close medical facilities are, says Kevin Merkle, the league's associate director. A metro-area school located close by a hospital has different needs than a small town school that's far from the nearest hospital, for example. "We highly recommend having trained medical personnel at every event and we have recommendations on how they're to respond" in an emergency.

Merkle says the league has rolled out a program called Anyone Can Save a Life, establishing protocols so personnel know how to respond in an emergency. "The key to the whole matter is that schools have all those plans in place, whether an ambulance, an EMT, a doctor or a trainer is at the event -- what's the plan in case of an injury, who's going to call 911, where's the ambulance going to get access," etc.

That said, some sports are more brutal than others; having an ambulance available at a high school football game would seem like a reassuring thing for everyone involved.

The Answer Man is an intellectual giant. Send questions to P.O. Box 6118, Rochester, MN 55903 or answerman@postbulletin.com.

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