Tom Judge
Thomas is the founding Executive Director of LifeFlight of Maine/ LifeFlight Foundation. Tom began his career volunteering for the St. George Volunteer Fire Fighters and EMS Association serving as an EMT and Paramedic for over forty years and introduced the first community paramedicine program in the State.
With an extensive background in emergency medical services and air medicine he has worked in the private, public and non-government sectors designing and implementing emergency care systems nationally and internationally. Thomas has served as an air medical and EMS subject matter expert for the Institute of Medicine, the US Government Accountability Office, the National Transportation Safety Board, the State of Maryland following the Trooper 2 crash, as well as serving five successive appointments to the Federal National EMS Advisory Council. He currently serves on a federal Advisory Commission to end surprise patient billing. Other current service includes the Board Quality Committee for the Coastal Healthcare Alliance (Pen Bay Medical Center and Waldo County General Hospital), the Rural Health Transformation Team for the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, and the Rural Health Action Network.
A long-time faculty member for the National EMS Physicians Association’s National EMS Medical Director Course, Judge has worked in multiple arenas developing standards for air medical and EMS including assisting with the development of the international standards of the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Organizations and led the development the first international standards for Critical Care Transport. A keen advocated for patient and operational safety Judge leads the Infrastructure work group for the US Helicopter Safety Team and has been a member of the International Helicopter Safety Team since its inception. He is a past Chair of the Association of Critical Care Transport, past President of the Association of Air Medical Services, a Board Member for the Medevac Foundation International, and served 10 years on the Maine EMS Regulatory Board including serving as Chair.
International work includes projects and presentations in Canada, throughout the UK, Ireland, Italy, Denmark, France, Czech Republic, Spain, Japan, Australia, and South Africa. A 1996 Atlantic Fellow in Public Policy sponsored by the British Foreign Office, Thomas worked across the UK with postings at the Medical Care Research Unit/ University of Sheffield, the Scottish National Ambulance Service, the King’ Fund, and was a founder ambulance member of the Faculty of Pre-Hospital Care of the Royal College of Surgeons Edinburgh. Thomas facilitated and helped author the proceedings from the International EMS Symposium held at Monkey Valley in South Africa and has served as on the editorial review group for the British Medical Emergency Care and Prehospital Emergency Care Journals.
He is the author of numerous articles on air medicine and EMS including new edition textbook chapters for the National Association of EMS Physicians and American College of Emergency Physicians and has been faculty for numerous international conferences. The recipient of multiple national leadership awards including the Jefferson Award for Public Service, an Atlantic Fellowship, the Charlson Award for Air Medical Safety, and the Keith Kneely for leadership and contributions to the science of emergency medicine from the National Association of EMS Physicians.
Thomas is particularly interested in patient safety, risk, standards development, system design, organizational culture and governance, and the effects of health care policy and in the issues of access and equity in the provision of rural medical care.
