Looking for advice/suggestions/all the above: I work for a private ambulance service in Florida where the 911 service is fire-rescue. Often times my service is called to a residence where fire-rescue has already responded and deemed the patient non-urgent and in no need of ER care. So the patient calls us and even though we are under the same impression as fire-rescue we take the patient to the ER because that is what we are told to do. Upon arrival to the ER the staff usually shakes their heads and asks us why we thought the transport was necessary.
And of course I am not trying to dodge work....but I feel that through my training I can tell that a scratch and bump on the elbow does not require adding to the deluge of patients to the ER's in my city. I agree that most patients should go to the ER just to be sure there are no additional problems, i'm not a doctor just an EMT-B but shouldn't there be room for discretion?
