SMCC trains immigrants with medical backgrounds to be EMTs

The new program, believed to be the first of its kind in the nation, is designed to meet a growing need for multilingual emergency medical technicians.

SOUTH PORTLAND — As a physician in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Jolly Ntirumenyerwa regularly stitched up wounded and bloody bodies, casualties of a long-running civil war that has killed several of her family members and led her to seek asylum here in Maine.

Now, Ntirumenyerwa, who lives in Portland, works two part-time jobs as a health care aide. Like many immigrants, her professional credentials aren’t recognized in the United States. But she dreams of returning to the front lines of medicine, where people need her skills the most. Read more»