Emerging EMS Technology: Strategic Leadership to Implementation. Two days of hands-on AI and technology work, built for the EMS leaders who will decide what comes next.
Includes a signed copy of the book, Thursday lunch, and 13 hours of professional development. Registration is handled by the Iowa EMS Association.
Data source: NEMSIS 2022 Public-Release Research Dataset. Original analysis by Donnie Woodyard, Jr.
EMS leaders are past the question of whether artificial intelligence, autonomous systems, advanced air mobility, and data-driven care will reshape prehospital medicine. They are not on the horizon. They are here. The real gap facing our field today is not awareness. It is implementation.
This is a two-day working session for the directors, chiefs, medical directors, and decision-makers who are ready to stop reading about the future and start building it. You will do the work alongside peers facing the same questions, and leave with the start of a plan you can act on Monday morning.
A short invitation from your host, on what the conference is, who it is for, and why it matters now.
Autonomous-vehicle pilots, eVTOL medical transport demonstrations, drone response programs, and AI-assisted documentation are no longer theoretical. The question for EMS leaders is not whether these technologies arrive, but how to evaluate them responsibly, on their own terms, before vendors, policymakers, or market pressure define those terms for them. That is what these two days are for.
A repeatable way to evaluate and adopt technology responsibly, so you can tell the difference between a tool that moves your system forward and a shiny distraction that drains your budget.
Direct connection and collaboration with other leaders carrying the same staffing math, the same budget pressure, and the same questions about how to modernize without breaking what works.
The language, the evidence, and the conviction to carry these AI conversations back into your own agency and lead them, instead of waiting to be told what to do.
We adopt deliberately. The goal is sound judgment about real tools, grounded in ethics, accountability, and policy. Not hype, and not fear.
You will put your own hands on AI platforms and large language models, live, from first prompt to power user. You will not watch someone else demo them from a stage.
The systems with the least slack have the most to gain. Rural and resource-limited EMS is a design priority here, woven through every session, not an afterthought.
The agencies that succeed will be the ones that prepare now, lead decisively, and implement strategically.
Agenda subject to refinement. Times shown in Central.
A nationally respected authority on EMS policy, mobility, and workforce regulation, Donnie Woodyard brings rare range to this inaugural event. His work spans EMS governance, education, and national security initiatives, placing him at the front of system-level transformation. He is a graduate of the Naval Postgraduate School's Executive Leaders Program and holds a Harvard University certificate in Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare, and his leadership is helping define how EMS systems evolve in an era of rapid technological disruption.
Registration is open now to hold your seat, confirmed based on availability. Capacity is limited by design, so registering early is the only way to guarantee a place in the room.
The future of EMS will not be led by vendors or software alone. It will be led by the professionals on the ground who understand that burnout, staffing shortages, and outdated systems are not abstract challenges. They are daily operational realities.
This is a working session, not an open-capacity expo. Registration is capped at 220 EMS leaders, so the room stays collaborative and the hands-on work stays workable. Once those seats are claimed, registration closes. If you intend to lead your system's future, register early through IEMSA.