It’s the rare EMT that’s on IMDB.
But Justin Tsai has that distinction. Tsai, 26, comes from a family involved in healthcare – his sister and fiancé are doctors, and his father worked in IT at New York-Presbyterian Hospital – and planned to work as a paramedic and rescue worker as a teenager County EMS Training Center and served several years as a lieutenant in the Township of Washington Ambulance Corps. In August 2020, he founded his own company, Tsai Mobile Health, to provide on-call first aid services to clients on a freelance basis.
What he never considered was that his work would lead to specialty and regular appearances for celebrities and producers in venues ranging from private hotel rooms to film sets. Past clients include musicians Lorde and Phoebe Bridgers, actors Neil Patrick Harris and Ben Foster, and well-known executives such as Barbara Corcoran.
Sometimes the jobs come with social benefits. “If someone had told the teenager that in less than 10 years I would be attending private celebrity parties, I would have been surprised!” he says, referring to a Thanksgiving celebration hosted by Matt Rogers, a comedian and co- host of Las Culturistas podcast with SNL’s Bowen Yang.
Tsai includes his middle initial of G. in official communications, he says, because there is actually another Justin Tsai who runs a medical company in Paramus, his hometown. But only one of them has been photographed with “Terminator” and “The Walking Dead” star Michael Biehn.
when do you call
While studying at Seton Hall University, Tsai used his summer vacations in the Southwest to gain more skills and insight into trauma treatment. He spent one summer in Area 22 north of Las Vegas doing counterterrorism training and two in New Mexico learning about nuclear and bomb threats. All three opportunities were subsidized and operated by FEMA and made possible because Tsai was a Washington Township EMT. During the summer after his junior year of college, he did an internship in trauma nursing at the University Hospital in Newark.
Weeks before receiving his bachelor’s degree in nursing, Tsai, as the public relations coordinator for the Township of Washington Ambulance Corps, was linked to a production manager who needed first aid supervision on some food commercials being filmed in Jersey City. The company that arranged his services eventually went bankrupt, but the experience connected Tsai to a manager who continued to hire him for repeated assignments.
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As word of mouth spread, Tsai’s reputation grew as a young man dedicated to keeping clients safe during filming and public events. Demand for EMT workers on the ground has increased in recent years, he says, due to tightening regulations. “If you have a cat or a dog in a show or a commercial, you need someone from the Humane Society and an EMT gift,” he notes.
Sometimes the risk is obvious when Discovery Channel flew him to Seattle to work with the crew on reality show Deadliest Catch. A workplace he covers might feature ceiling machines or involve fireworks, a gun being fired, or drag racing.
Crowds are potential sources of danger – and COVID. (Since his company started during COVID, it has taken on the additional component of coronavirus safety advice; Tsai maintains COVID testing and sometimes has to enforce coronavirus protocols.) He was hired as an on-call paramedic to attend a pre-New Year’s event in Times Square , as automaker Kia presented a gathering of reporters and onlookers with the numbers that would be seen behind the annual ball drop. “A few days before Christmas, the Omicron variant was out and people were lining up to take photos,” he says. “I had to tell people they were too close together.”
The unexpected is also a source of risk. In October, Tsai was working on a film set at a hotel when an actor reached into his backpack and accidentally impaled his finger on a knife blade. “I told the owner of the company producing the film that we need to go to the hospital because he’s bleeding to death and we can’t stop it on our own.” Luckily, a hospital was only 15 minutes away.
Other times, individuals need an EMT in an environment that looks decidedly innocuous — for example, in the home where the 2022 Oscar nominees were announced in February. “There’s a person speaking through a video feed, a camera crew, a first-class detective from the NYPD, and I there, and we’re all focused on the VIP,” says Tsai.
Well-known individuals like “shark tank” Barbara Corcoran, whom Tsai covered when she returns to Bergen County to meet with other real estate executives at a hotel, are at risk because they are potential targets, he says. The same goes for live performers. “God forbid anyone comes to one of these shows like they did when Phoebe Bridgers was on Stone Pony, and I’m responsible for any harm that someone with a gun might do,” he says.
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Continue with the performance
Like most healthcare professionals, Tsai believes in continuing education to stay current and prepared. Over the past eight years he has expanded his skills by attending seminars and becoming licensed and/or certified in specialty areas such as wilderness first aid, advanced stroke life support, use of hazardous materials and psychological trauma emergencies.
Sometimes, when he’s already committed to a job, he outsources the work to other paramedics on a day-to-day basis — like he did when he worked for the Discovery Channel in Massachusetts for two months and was invited to provide first aid the singer Lorde at a concert on Roosevelt Island in the same period. “Between the pandemic and many film productions, the fall of 2021 was the busiest time,” says Tsai. When he hires others to do the reporting, he says it is “a win-win-win for myself, the hired person and the client. I want the customer to know someone will be there.”
Tsai is proud to say, “I take care of everyone.” Noah Williams, a producer and director for Vox Media who has worked with him on several projects, has observed how well Tsai fits into his chosen field. He remembers a shoot for Toyota that was done during a massive snowstorm. “Justin is a happy spirit who cares deeply about his work and that of his care,” says Williams. “He’s been absorbed into the production landscape like a fish in water.”
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