A nurse brushed by Dr. RJ Frascone at St. Paul-Ramsey Medical Center on Feb. 15, 1978. He already could tell something was wrong, but she confirmed it.

“Did you hear the Commodore blew up?” she asked.

Frascone was a 30-year-old physician, seven years out of his residency at what is now Regions Hospital. He learned that a gas leak caused two explosions at the Commodore Hotel in St. Paul, injuring dozens of people and leading him into the biggest challenge he had ever faced.

“Don’t joke about this,” he replied to the nurse.

She wasn’t joking. More than 70 patients were brought to Regions within a span of ten minutes. The emergency was called a “code orange” at the hospital, which meant all hands on deck.

With each patient paired to a doctor and firefighters refusing to receive medical attention until civilians were taken care of, the team of medical personnel managed to treat all the injured without a single casualty.

Frascone felt energized. He knew he was in the right line of work.

The self-proclaimed adrenaline junkie went on to spend another 37 years as a Regions Hospital Emergency Department doctor before retiring from that job in June at age 71, though he remains the medical director of Regions Hospital Emergency Medical Services team.

2 MILLION AMBULANCE CALLS

Through the years, Frascone and his EMS team faced emergency after emergency from approximately 2 million ambulance calls, according to Frascone.

“What emergency medicine is, is family practice on steroids,” he said recently. “It’s fast-paced. You see a lot of lives threatened.”

Frascone said his experience with the Commodore explosion helped him when he faced other major catastrophes through the years.

In 2017, Frascone won the Air Medical Physician Association’s national Medical Director of the Year.

Frascone also teaches medical students from the University of Minnesota and residents.

A COMMITMENT TO HELPING

One of his former residents at Regions, Dr. Bjorn Peterson, is now Frascone’s colleague.

Peterson said he witnessed Frascone’s commitment to his profession time and again. Once, he recalled Frascone driving to a conflict-filled protest to try and help those in need, despite having his back window smashed open with a brick by somebody on the interstate.

“He’s seen I don’t know how many fire chiefs, mayors, city councils,” Peterson said. “The tide comes in and it goes out. He’s one of those guys who keeps our heads level.”

Frascone lives in Lake Elmo with his wife, who is a nurse at Regions. Their three children have made careers of their own.