Just Plain Ruff

So is that the prologue or the first chapter? I'd like to know more about how you are going to help the provider balance volunteerism and life outside ems/firefighting. What is your experience? What can you offer the newbie emt who just got into this line of work? How long have you been in the business? ARe you a volunteer or a professional responder? Basically, what can you provide to the reader that they cannot go out and get today at Barnes and noble? I also would not post your book in a piecemeal fashion here. YOu need to establish a core group of people you trust on this forum or outside it that won't steal your ebook idea and use it as their own. There's a lot of stealing of ideas out there and I'm not saying that anyone here will do that but that's what we have copyright laws for. So get a group of trusted people and have them review your book if you are planning on publishing it. IT would suck if you went to all the trouble of writing this gem and someone decided to steal it and publish it out from under you after you posted your work here. You might be on to a best seller, probably not, not many get a best seller, but who knows. Good luck.

Be careful and cautous where you look. Those understaffed services sometimes are places that have reasons for being understaffed. But that being said, it sounds like you both need new venues and new leases on your EMS careers. I have nothing new to say other than echoing what has been said before on these threads. Too bad Admin won't allow us to put a long thread with a list of services to avoid like the bubonic plague with a side of Ebola served up cold. We would call it The toxic EMS service thread. Places to go work for only if you enjoy masturbating with a sheet of 90 grit sandpaper and then pouring hydrochloric acid on the wound. But I don't think Admin would allow that type of thread here so we must move forward and hope that none of us ever work for a service like that.

46 pages on how to transport a child in an ambulance. Leave it to the government to do in 46 pages what we as providers have learned to do in less than one page. Seriously. You secure the child as best you can given the equipment that you are provided. I know that we can do better with better equipment but our services just won't provide better equipment to provide better restraining systems for children, toddlers and infants as well as adults. But the report cited only 2 children fatally injured in ambulance accidents and those children were killed in other vehicles rather than the ambulances. I didn't see a number for children injured inside the ambulances though. So is there a problem with us transporting children safely? According to the government YES but according to the 46 page report, not really. And on page 10 there is an entire discussion on the "non-technical" definition of a child. Really So I say keep doing what we as providers are doing well, transporting millions of people yearly, both safely and quickly, and leave the government to wasting money on 46 page papers on how to transport children and others. 46 pages. Wow. I wonder how many years this study and group spent on this topic.

And now if you are using the Apple Maps for getting around, you may never get where you are trying to get. Apple maps is turning out to be a bit of a PR nightmare with the release of the new Iphone.

I agree, I'm sure that there will be a race card thrown out there soon. I'm sure that there is a lawsuit coming. I think the article makes that clear. The actions of this firefighter were let's say beyond bad. Especially the comment about gutting the mama. That's beyond the pale. If I was this mother, I would be wanting more than an apology. If it was my wife and his comments were directed at her, I'd probably be waiting outside this guys house and taking it up with him in private. We'd have ourselves a little come to christ meeting. I wonder how tough he would be in person.

Ok, for those who want to know what the content of the post that got the firefighter to resign, this is the text. This really was a nasty post. Maybe he should have resigned over this or have been fired. You decide. Here's the post. Sometime following the accident, Alexander posted the following public post on his Facebook wall: “People never cease to amaze me. Mama yelling oh my baybee my baybee….Hey you stupid ass, where was babyeees mama at while your 2 year old was getting hit by a truck. Mama needs to have her guts cut so there wont be anymore babies. Freeloading ignorant woman”

MedicAR, the world owes them because they believe that the world owes them becuase that's how they were raised. Simple as that.

It takes a firmly grounded person in themself to admit that they were wrong in how wrong they were. You are on the road to recovery from being a burned out provider to a new born medic. What you have learned from that one doctor set you straight brother, and what you needed was that kick in the pants. It takes a strong person to realize that you have some growing to do and you are doing just that. Now what you do with that new chance is what will be the key. I am humbled that you chose to share your journey with us here at the city. Just realize that you can fall back into the trap of where you were at all over again so it is incumbent upon you to not go back there again. Just keep your priorities straight and I am sure that you will do fine. You have a core group of people here who have probably been in your shoes before and you can lean on this medic here as I've been in your shoes. I did take some time off due to being burned out. I lived a similar story. And came back a better person for it. But there are others here with similar if not deeper stories as well. Thanks for sharing and if it helps another EMT or Medic out, you've helped out immensely. Goodluck on medic school brother. Good luck.

BCBS Director of Public Relations Sharon Torgerson said the switch was made in an effort to rein in health care costs, citing examples of non-network ambulance services charging as much as 500 percent more than what the federal government, Medicare, pays for the exact same service. So are you telling me that the same ambulance run for an in network patient costs 500% less than for an out of network patient? NO wonder why BCBS made the switch. NOte to AMR and all the other health care providers out there, This has got to stop, there is no way in hell that the same ambulance ride or health care procedure done on the same day to two different patients can cost vastly different amounts. A ambulance ride or a CT scan costs exactly the same amount of money. But you bill the patients vastly different amounts. NO wonder why people are pissed off at you for your prices. A ct scan for one person that costs 5500 but costs another person 1500 is blatantly unfair. Make it one price for all and stick to it. This is why people are pissed off at healthcare costs. This is also why people don't pay their bills. They think that what insurance pays is what they feel that they only have to pay. Make it one price and stop gouging those who can pay. Stop making those who can pay, stop making them pay for the three who refuse to pay. You cannot make up what you can't collect by forcing it out of the person who can pay. What I'm saying is that if I can pay my bill, do not tack on additional amounts to make up for the deadbeat who refuses to pay his bill. Don't make me pay the deadbeats bill just because I can pay mine. That's not fair and that's what pisses me off.

ok, this is one of those events that pisses me off to no end. none of those children knew how to swim yet they allowed those kids into the water. What the HELL. Those adults all bear responsiblity for the injuries sustained to those children for allowing them in the water without life jackets. This is negligence of the first order. All should be cited for child neglect and endangerment and NOT be held up as heroes. They put these children in harms way and should be held responsible for these childrens injuries. This just pisses me off that this happened. There should be no praising the parents who let these kids go swimming.

And they thought they were getting off easy for just losing their licenses and what nots. This will have far reaching ramifications all for a bunch of idiots taking the easy way out. But there has to be a bunch of ambulance services trying to figure out how much money they are goign to have to pay back to medicare, private insurance and medicaid and then trying to figure out how much in penalties and interest and all that they will have to pay. I'll bet that some of the services have already contacted the above mentioned entities to mitigate the amount they will have to pay due to the unlicensed providers. I think that if they come forward on their own the hammer won't be so hard to fall. but if the don't, then it won't just be a hammer, it will be a sledgehammer on a 10 penny nail. And the provider who thought that their job was safe, will no longer be working there because of the money that they caused the service to pay out.

Bath salts and zombies, the ultimate combination - Where is Judge Dredd and the Expendables when we need them.

Look for further penalties for services who's emt's involved in the scandal in the article to be looked at closely as well. The falsifying of emt re-certification scandal is going to cost some other services some big bucks as well.

I don't know DocZ, the year that Anthony and I went and Anthony won the airway gauntlet, the weather was cold but not terrible. Are you sure that it's been bad every year.

In the area where I used to work, we had 1 maybe 2 ambulances to cover the entire county. When we had a bad wreck and both ambulances were out on that wreck, that's it, the county was uncovered and mutual aid was it. If more than 2 ambulances for the wreck were needed or another ambulance call came in, well, we just had to wait or the other patient just had to wait. There were times when two nurses had to jump in the third ambulance we had in the garage and go on the call or we would start calling local crew members. Luckily this didn't happen a lot but it did happen. Unfortunately, we live in a world with finite resources and unfortunately, when you are the one requesting the resource that finite doesn't allow for, then you have to wait. It sucks, and causes bad press for the ambulance service but that's the name of the game and until more money is allotted for more ambulances, then this will continue to happen and even throwing more money at this problem will not stop the calls from coming in. You just hope that you can provide for the population you serve. This is why prediction services such as SSM and other types of models are so popular.

Dilaupid Stat!!!!

Well Richard, I was the editor in chief for a very short lived online EMS Magazine, and also has a scene safety article published in the magazine. I have a number of short stories ready for publishing as well as one novellette ready for publishing. I'm on chapter 39 of a novel (page 290) which I don't think will ever get done at the rate I'm going. So yes, I'm published. Yay me?!!!

I think we will become Firesqems That's what we will become. But that will only be one step short of the borg and Dammit Biebs - You WILL be assimilated, whether you like it or NOT!!! Why fight it, Assimilation is inevitable, resistence is fUUtile, They are the borg, you will serve the borg, you will be added to the borg.

AS one who has attended, I also agree that if you have the opportunity to attend, this is completely the best hands on lab you will get. where else will you get to see (if you are one of the first in the airway station) the docs initiate a tension pneumo and see the trachea deviate and then, when you decompress the chest with your needle, you see the trachea move back midline. I alas was not one of the first but the discussion of this visual was pretty cool. And Anthony, if you win the airway gauntlet this year I'm gonna cry "Rigged"

Look at the last paragraph. The light was green, then turned yellow and then red. He said he wasn't goign to be able to stop the ambulance in time. Remember this folks, the ambulance is not like your car, it does not stop quickly. For those new EMT's who are going to be driving soon. READ this article and learn by it.

It's a pity, seems not to be a priority in India. But there are a lot of other underlying problems than not having trained paramedics to respond. The list is very long.

I believe he posted identifiable patient, no pt names, but information nonetheless, on Facebook and that's what got him into trouble Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2

Great idea Artic, but I had it first, in 1997. Anywho, we can both take credit. But if the NTSB or whatever agency dictates it then automakers would have to put it in, just like seat belts, but the court cases to keep it out would last for years so it won't happen any time soon. But the proactive automakers would make it optional. But the current siren is here to stay. Sorry to say it but there isn't anything that is going to take it's place in the next 20 years. Just isn't going to happen. But seriously, how much time do we really save in using lights and sirens anyway in getting to the scene of an emergency? a minute or two? Weve beaten the dead horse of transporting lights and sirens but have we really addressed the responding emergency to scenes horse yet on this forum?

getting his/her money back is the least of his/her worries if he/she doesn't pass the registry test this third time don't you think? I agree with Chris, you need to get your breakdown scores and look at what you are proficient in and what you are not. Then work on that. I'm not sure how long you have to take the written again but I'd use that time to maybe take a refresher course. It seems that what you are currently doing is just not cutting the mustard so you need to go about it from a completely different angle. I'm not sure how you have been studying but maybe if you outline your study regimen here you will get some tips on what to do differently. If you are reading and taking tests after reading then that's not the right way to go. Do you have access to a community college? They have learning labs that can help you work on overcoming your test anxiety and if you took your emt class from a community college then they should be able to help you free of charge or at a reduced rate. Maybe you just need to take the emt class again? Sometimes people just don't get the material the first time around. I know several people who failed the registry twice and said FRick it and took the class again. They passed the first time on the 2nd time around. But honestly, this is basic stuff, what are you missing? That's what you have to dig down deep and figure out. What are you missing that is making you fail? What concepts are you not grasping? What items are you not getting, what big picture are you not latching onto that is making you fail the exam? Once you figure that out, you will, I am sure, Pass the test. It's up to you "grasshopper" to figure that out.

Or maybe not. Im sure there is the station fridge diver who steals even marked food. Would serve them right to get a little bit of breast milk. Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2