A LifeFlight crew gets a helicopter ready for flight at the Sanford Seacoast Regional Airport on July 8. The air ambulance service recently partnered with data analytics students at the Roux Institute to find ways to reduce the time it takes to get off the ground. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

When LifeFlight of Maine gets a call, someone is usually having a life-threatening medical crisis.

It could be that a motorcycle rider has crashed and is badly injured. Or that a person having a stroke at a small, rural hospital needs to be transported to a larger facility better equipped to help them.

As the air ambulance crew often says, “time is tissue,” according to LifeFlight nurse Brandon Mayo. They need to act quickly to stop organs from being damaged.

But it can take up to 20 minutes before one of the nonprofit’s medical crews is airborne. There are about 15 steps required before takeoff from their bases in Sanford, Lewiston and Bangor.

Carry bags of blood from the base’s refrigerator to the aircraft.

Put on helmets. Set up night-vision goggles.

Move the helicopter from the hangar to the tarmac.

Every opportunity to shave seconds off the chute time – the period between being dispatched and taking off – means the potential to save more lives.

LifeFlight wants to cut about five minutes from that process, decreasing it by 25%, according to Chief Operating Officer Bill Cyr.

So the organization partnered with Northeastern University’s Roux Institute in Portland, where graduate students in an experiential learning course spent 12 weeks this spring analyzing data to pinpoint where LifeFlight could be more efficient.

LifeFlight pilot Kevin Beaulieu uses a tractor to move a helicopter from a hanger as paramedic Paul Silva walks beside it at the Sanford Seacoast Regional Airport on July 8. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Now, the nonprofit, which is owned by Northern Light Health and Central Maine Healthcare, is working on implementing some of those changes.

LifeFlight provided Roux students with records such as call logs and flight logs, and students sourced other data externally, including about the weather during flights. The students set up a dashboard to show chute times for different crew members, both individually and as flight teams, which typically include one pilot, one nurse and one medic.

Cyr said that, as a result of the analysis, LifeFlight is reevaluating aspects like where to store helicopters before takeoff and how to keep the blood cooled properly on board longer so it doesn’t have to be transported from the base refrigerator each time.

Across its three bases, LifeFlight has five helicopters, one plane and two ambulances, with a third being added soon. The vehicles and staff are considered mobile intensive care units and therefore have more drugs and procedure capabilities than regular ambulances or nurses. LifeFlight, which is the only air ambulance service in the state, is also the only emergency medical service of any kind in Maine that is able to carry blood. It receives about six to eight calls per day and helps over 2,000 patients a year access life-saving care in crucial moments, according to its website.

“I think it was very impactful for (the Roux students) to be really part of the chain of survival for people in Maine who need to use LifeFlight,” Cyr said. “We really emphasized that point, that the work they’re doing is actually helping save lives. So I think they made that connection, and it was really powerful for them.”

At the Roux Institute, data analytics students are required to take two experiential learning courses where they work with an organization to solve problems. Students collaborate on teams but also propose independent research projects with alternative solutions or areas of focus for the partnering business.

“It’s a really nice pedagogy that allows for the students to get a lot of benefit in terms of stretching their brains and using the techniques that they’ve learned … and the sponsor gets a lot of benefit,” said Dan Koloski, who was the course’s professor and is the head of learning programs at the Roux Institute.

Colin Campbell, a student in the course, said it was valuable to get experience doing real-world data analytics with businesses, especially when it gives back to the community.

“We traveled up to see (LifeFlight’s Bangor base) and just doing that really connected all the dots for me, like, ‘Wow, I’m really giving back to the community through my studies,’ ” said Campbell, who is from Bangor. “I think that’s huge for the Roux Institute as well – being able to give back to Maine and also give to the students the education that they need to succeed.”

A LifeFlight helicopter arrives at the Sanford Seacoast Regional Airport on July 8. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Since it opened in 2020, the Roux Institute has partnered with several other Maine organizations for similar analyses, including L.L.Bean, the Governor’s Energy Office, the Dempsey Center and Portland Community Squash.

Koloski said the institute is happy to partner with local nonprofits, schools, government agencies and businesses because it gives the students hands-on experience in the real world while also benefitting Maine’s economy and people. By working with businesses during their education, students are also able to connect with potential employers that can encourage them to stay and work in Maine.

It is free for businesses to participate in this particular course model, but other partnership programs carry costs, such as paying student employees.

“Having (the students) do what they do best and then letting us do what we do best, that partnership is what’s going to make not only our organization, but any small business that works with them, much more productive in what they do,” Cyr said.