chelleak

We use lights and siren during traffic situtations or when doing a code in route to the hospital. Transports to another hospital other than our one local are usually 100+ miles and we don't use lights and sirens unless the patient goes critical in route. Many times you can't get a medivac into our hospital due to weather conditions.

I see a lot of great suggestions here so I won't re-invent the wheel. I'm from a very rural area where our service area can be anywhere from 1 mile to 100 miles so battery life is a must. Our roads are not the greatest so the monitor needs to be able to differentiate between heart rhythm and bad roads. All the other suggestions including a way to strap it to the gurney I agree with whole heartedly. One suggestion...don't have so many bells and whistles that it takes college class and several hours of lab work to figure it all out.

One is a diagnostic technique. The other is a medical intervention. The AED diagnoses and treats an immediately life-threatening problem on a clinically dead patient. You just said it yourself....AED DIAGNOSES & treats. So give it up and get over it. Just because you're a Paramedic/RN doesn't make you better than anyone else. Paramedic or Paragod? Get back to your roots if you have them.

[/font:8cd7b7930d] Anybody ever heard of using a glucometer in the back of an ambulance. Doesn't always have to be done on scene. And in rural areas, you're more likely to load and go and continue treatment in the back of the bus. Have a good night folks.

[/font:4ab12c5a36] It may not change treatment for a BLS crew (we run ALS) but it will change the information given to the receiving hospital when report is given. In that way you may actually be cutting down the time that hospital personnel are using to do rule outs. So if it's no more complicated that using your universal remote. Why not teach it. If you have lay people giving defib shocks with AED's why not teach a BLS person who is more medically trained than that bystander at the airport using the AED how to use a glucometer? :roll:

[/font:7f2da762b7] I would rather have a Basic learn how to use a glucometer than not. Anyone can buy a glucometer off the shelf at any drug store and teach themselves how to use one. Diabetics use them every day of their lives and the are not even BLS trained. Glucometers are not difficult and they provide a useful piece of information. Someone here gave the example of EKG and 12 leads. How about the fact that AED's are getting more common place and you don't have to be a basic to use those either.

Sorry but I was always told to treat the patient not the machine. You don't know how many times I've had a situation where the leads have been knocked off. Check your patient!

In Alaska things are somewhat rural. It use to be our troopers were all at least EMT1 certified (I wish they still had that requirement) so if they turned you around they knew what they were talking about. That's not the case anymore. As a general rule, the troopers will usually ask us to proceed to the scene even when they know the patient will refuse to make sure all the bases are covered. If we are cancelled by AST or PD then we can at our discretion (depending on pucker factor) continue to the scene.