FARMINGTON – NorthStar recently held its annual recognition and awards banquet to honor its staff of emergency medical technicians. NorthStar is the ambulance service of Franklin Memorial Hospital and operates throughout Greater Franklin County. The banquet was the culmination of National Emergency Medical Services Week.

Highlighting the evening was NorthStar’s EMT of the Year Award, which recognizes an employee for going “above and beyond” system-wide during the year. The award was bestowed on Carol Pillsbury of Farmington.

Pillsbury’s dedication and support to NorthStar and EMS at the local, regional and state level span almost three decades. Her training efforts and work on the quality committee, her willingness to work shifts at all the bases in the system and her overall positive attitude led to the selection.

Pillsbury has been a paramedic in the Farmington area almost since there was an ambulance service there. She has served on the Maine EMS Board, has received the state Governor’s Award for EMS Excellence and has taught most of the EMT courses in the area over the last three decades.

In presenting the award, NorthStar Executive Director David Robie said, “Carol is EMS! If you look up EMS in Wikipedia, I have no doubt you will find Carol’s picture. In all things, Carol exemplifies NorthStar’s mission: professionalism, respectful patient care, community activities, stewardship of our resources and overall excellence. We are very fortunate to have such an outstanding paramedic in our service.”

Robie also recognized Pillsbury for putting together the EMS week program, including the awards night celebration.

Other awards were also given out. “Above and Beyond” awards went to Chuck Twitchell, WEMT-P, Kingfield, for his work with the Route 27 corridor first responders, and Mike Senecal, WEMT-P, Industry, for his education, training and management achievements.

The 400 Club Awards (for 400+ ambulance runs in a year) went to Stan Wilcox (a two-time winner), Sam Davis, Gavin Smith and Dean Robinson. The most active per diem was awarded to Ed Strapp for the second straight year.

Several other awards, some serious, some humorous were also given out. Every member of the NorthStar staff was recognized as a contributor to the success of the system.

It was also noted that Judi Wills, New Portland, was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by the governor and Maine EMS earlier in the week. It marked the fourth straight year that a NorthStar person was awarded one of the highest state awards.