From a fan of skiing to a skiing doctor, Dr. Fu Yan has come a long way in the past three years. Dr. Fu usually works in the Intensive Care Department at Xiyuan Hospital, which is run by the China Academy of Medical Sciences in Beijing. However, for the duration of the Olympics, she will be working in the Yanqing Competition Zone on the outskirts of the capital, in what has come to be known as the National Alpine Ski Center Medical Dream Team.  

As part of preparations for the Winter Games, the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games (BOCOG) set themselves the task of establishing China's first ever high-level Alpine-skiing medical unit in 2018. To do so, they scoured the top hospitals in Beijing and surrounding Hebei Province for talented doctors in relevant fields with experience on the snow. Dr. Fu was selected with more than 70 others, underwent three years of intensive training, and began working at the National Alpine Ski Center on Jan. 22.  

To ensure the safety of athletes during the 2022 Games, BOCOG developed a medical transport system that incorporates skiing doctors stationed on the slopes, one mountain rescue helicopter equipped with a winch, a medical transport helicopter equipped with ICU equipment and staff, and newly refurbished and upgraded hospitals close by.  

2008 was not only the year Beijing hosted the Summer Olympic Games, but also the year Dr. Fu began working at Xiyuan Hospital and the year she developed an interest in skiing. By 2018, she'd become a competent skier and experienced doctor, and those attributes, along with her English skills, caught the eye of BOCOG and secured her a position on the Dream Team.  

Dr. Fu told Beijing Review that where skiing had previously been just a hobby, her new role made her acutely aware that she'd need to improve not only her skiing skills but also her quick thinking, cooperation and emergency management skills also. Competitors at the National Alpine Skiing Center travel at speeds of up to 140 km per hour, potentially leading to a wide variety of serious injuries and making the role of medical staff critical to the safe running of events. 

While the doctors selected for the team were all competent skiers, the world-class Olympic-level runs at the National Alpine Skiing Center are necessarily among the toughest in the world, and developing the skills to competently and quickly negotiate them while also carrying equipment was a mammoth task for trainees and trainers alike. Dr. Fu often undertook her training while carrying 15 kg of equipment and, over her three years of preparation, lost 15 kg in bodyweight. As they are China's first Alpine skiing medical team, all procedures, plans and strategies were developed during the preparation period. 

Treating patients on the mountain is often much harder than in hospitals. The International Ski Federation Medical Guide stresses that the trauma teams should be capable of reaching any critically injured athlete within four minutes and initial treatment should be completed within 15 minutes. The weather conditions at the ski center have also challenged the doctors' medical abilities as, during the coldest training sessions, temperatures on the mountain dropped as low as -30 degrees Celsius.  

According to Dr. Fu, their fingers would go numb soon after they removed their gloves, presenting a challenge for medical procedures that require dexterity, such as intubations. Dr. Fu said that in order to carry out intubations more quickly in cold conditions, she practiced on dummies to develop muscle memory. "At first, the procedure took me 30 seconds. Now it only takes less than 10," she said. 

The difficult terrain at the Alpine ski center has also posed great challenges for the doctors. According to Dr. Fu, the coaches who trained the doctors told them they would have no time to find flat surfaces when treating injured athletes. Accordingly, the coaches chose awkward, uneven or precipitous areas of the center to test the doctors, and placed strict requirements on their performance.  

The doctors' training brought not only challenges but also real risk of serious injury. During a simulation of transporting an injured athlete by helicopter, a strong mountain airflow caused the helicopter to descend suddenly. The quick reaction of the pilot saved the helicopter and their lives, but the incident left Dr. Fu with a fractured shoulder. 

Fu spent this year's Spring Festival, which fell on Feb. 1, practicing drills with her colleagues. Each day the team members take the cable cars to the stations on the mountain where they work, and many see the time on the cable cars as an opportunity to rest.  

"I hope that we are never needed during the Games, but we will be there all the time in case accidents happen," Fu said. 

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