JakeEMTP

My partner and I were just discussing this very thing on the way back to the station from our latest call. I can only think of a few occasions where L & S would be required whilst enroute to the hospital. Every time we leave the station there is a chance we could be in a collision. The same thing could be said for when I leave for home. Do I need a helmet for my POV? Where do we draw the line? I realise that while providing pt. care your eyes are someplace other than on the road and you are more likely to be taken by surprise. Communication from the driver would be nice as to the upcoming impact. I too wear my vest whenever I feel exposed to traffic or darkness and there is some form of danger, ie: trying to reach someone who fell from a tree stand. A vest is an important piece of your equipment. A helmet in the back of an ambulance, not so much. Holy crap! A 4 year old thread. Although relevant do to the recent discussion in a similar thread. Good find spenac!

Yeah, I got that, thanks. I thought that's why we have a radio on the ambulance. Check enroute, put ambulance in drive and go. Stop,place ambulance in park, check on scene. There is really no need to have a cell phone on an ambulance, although it is a requirement here in NC. All the communication we need to do can be done over the radio.

She has my vote for the Darwin Award 2010. I know it's early and the possibility of someone doing something more stupid always is prevalent, but I cast my vote now. Oh, she was arrested the day before for a DUI and had had her license suspended 5 previous times. Yet in the court systems infinite wisdom, she was not held. Maybe I need to rethink my vote already!

Yeah, I have basically the same opinion. I have actually put us OOS while I waited for a my supervisor. My partner du jour (while my regular partner was out sick) wouldn't put his phone down like I requested, so I put him out. My safety is paramount. If you continue to use your phone with me sitting beside you, who knows what you're doing when I am otherwise occupied and can't see you? Note: To all drivers who feel the need to converse while driving. You really aren't that important. Unless you have the attention span of a gnat, hold your thought until the vehicle is stopped and you have exited!

Ummm, the ambulance didn't respond fast enough for whom. How many truly life and death, if the pt. is transported immediately to the hospital they'll die, calls do they really get? Or did they not respond fast enough so the AFD crew could go back to the recliners? Without intimate knowledge of the dynamics regarding the types of call in Albuquerque NM, I can't say for sure. However, if the calls are even remotely similar to the rest of the Country, I'm sure the pt. could wait if the 1st responders are doing their job. I'm at work so I couldn't open the video, but did they mention the response time (delay) for the ambulance?

"Sigh". Here we go again. This is nothing more than a pissing contest. The IAFF local 106 doesn't think they need to pony up to the Medical Director's standards. The Medical Director requires that they do. What is the problem? Either measure up or move on. This is eerily similar to the debacle that is Collier County FL, same debate, different coast, same players. Some of the comments are hilarious! It is not difficult to tell which posters are the hose monkeys.

Everything you need to know about ECG's and how to read them can be learned from this text. http://www.emergencyekg.com/ The cardiovascular system should have been covered in your A & P class. However,there is always room to learn further. Try this site and see if it helps you. Without the knowledge of the Cardiovascular system though, it may be a little advanced right now. http://www.emergencymedicine.ucla.edu/ECGChallenge/ Good luck with your class!

Would the last word be difference Dwayne? I don't think your post was idiotic. I think you tried to portray the job for what it really is. The problem is, if they had a show about how EMS really was it would be as entertaining as watching paint dry. There has to be some form of sensationalism for the show to sell, I get that. If they would just try and introduce some realism into the programme and dispose of some of the fluff, they might just make it. I agree with the post above yours though. The helo has to go!

Ummm yeah. I got that part. What I mean is, it is not what I do therefore it is something different. If I was a Lawyer I might not watch Law and Order and find Trauma entertaining. Why do I want to watch something that I do everyday?

Hmmm, I don't know. I just don't watch it anymore. I think I watched 2 full episodes and bits and pieces of others. I recall saying in a previous thread about "Trauma", I could perhaps forgive the bad medicine if the acting and storyline was better. I do not like any of the lead characters enough to follow them each week. The storylines are for the most part, predictable. I understand the film and televisions job is to entertain. I think the reason I enjoy Law and Order so much is because I have no real involvement in the justice system. I don't know the daily in's and out's if you will of the legal profession. Therefore, I find it entertaining. Conversely, with Trauma, I do have a fairly good idea of how things should or should not be done. That is why I find it so difficult to watch. It is not entertaining to me, in fact I find it borderline painful to watch. The wonderful thing about living here is I can choose whatever I want (or my partner and I can compromise on) to watch. I/we choose to not watch Trauma.

Yeah, I feel sorry for the widow and at first glance it appears there may have been some error's in judgment made regarding pt. care, but who knows for sure. I have to wonder though about her claim that washing the truck partially led to her husband's death. Isn't washing the apparatus part of the job?

Now THAT was some funny stuff!

Excellent post Vent! Glad to have you back!

Why not send one guy in this so that if a call comes in, and the flunky is in the district where he should be, the fire dude should beat the engine/ladder to the call. http://www.massmetrofire.org/images/BostonH1Met.JPG It makes no sense to take this. http://www.cityofboston.gov/fire/images/Ladder%2026%20big.JPG I know, I know. Let the "what if's" begin.

Umm..........I don't know. I was shocked to hear that a County very near to where I work only began doing 12 leads a few months ago. At the same time, I have the ability to activate the Cath team from my ambulance and my County and the other one are separated by mere miles. I don't get it. Like you said, why can't ALL medics use this technology for the betterment of the patient? It is about the pt. right? At minimum, if the Medical Director doesn't trust the medics working under his license, then equip your medics with the ability to transmit ECG's and the Attending can make the call. I just don't get it.

Well done! This is the kind of patient care that needs to be a National Standard. Hello? Kudos to the medic and his ability through education to recognise a STEMI and the need to activate the cath lab!

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, we must be watching different videos.

Are you willing to bet someone's life on that? I guess you are willing to bet. I went back and watched the video again. Still haven't seen the part about the ambulance being stuck, only that it couldn't go any further. I will however go back and look again. See above. Our job is to respond. I had to walk into the woods to get a pt. who had been hit with a tree branch on the head and was unresponsive, because we couldn't get the ambulance to him. Was I to wait until they brought him to me? I didn't think so and called additional resources to assist. To ask the pt. to walk to you instead of you going to them is disgusting. If they thought it was feasible for the pt. to come to them, they should have considered it feasible for them to go to the patient.

I don't know Herbie. If the "paramedics" had the audacity to ask the pt. to walk to them, maybe they should have walked to the pt. After all, he was the one who called for help. The portable radio is a wonderful tool. If once arriving at the pt. they discovered they required additional resources to help carry the pt. to the ambulance, there was according to the report, 8 burly fireman 1/2 a block away.

Don't be ridiculous. I would expect more from you. You will be hard pressed to find a bigger advocate for the furtherance of EMS education than myself, so don't try and trivialize my point. If a well educated Paramedic can recognise what the patient's symptoms are and can treat the pt. accordingly, how is the way you would do things different? It was an honest question which deserved an honest answer. No one is trying to compare a Paramedics education to that of a Physician. That would be silly. Just having a Physician on an ambulance does not mean the pt. would have a different outcome.

Yeah, they might not teach you the term diesel bolus in school. It simply means get them to the hospital ASAP. Dwayne has given you some excellent advise. Try to think through your interventions instead of just doing them because "the book says so". Good luck with your class! You're off to a great start!

Well, since we don't have the capability to do a catheterization in the field, how would your treatment of the MI patient differ?

No you didn't kill your patient. 1) I would continue assisting the patient in his effort to breathe with the BVM. The problem is your patient isn't breathing adequately. Switching to a NRB wouldn't be beneficial to your patient in this case with the info provided. He might just revert back to the condition you found him in. He may be breathing on his own but is he A & O? If not, then continue bagging. 2)A jaw thrust is the appropriate method of opening the airway in this case for the reasons you describe. In response to the second part of your question, I have improved the breathing of quite a few patient's at nursing homes by simply raising the head end of the bed. Lying supine in respiratory distress is not the preferred method of treatment. Reassess and administer O2 via NRB. If you need to bag them, then by all means do it! The key is to always reassess after you provide an intervention no matter how simple it may seem. Suction if needed and at the EMT-B level, a diesel bolus to the hospital.

Best of luck Ruff!

Hey, that's just how we roll!