island emt

Good choices Marty: I'd just add The all time classic by Iron butterfly INA GADDA DA VIDA and some slow hand Clapton for a little variety!

All the members of our service have been issued Zoll AED-plus units as part of their personal jump kits,, in addition to a trauma bag & O2 kit. The reason why is because we cover an area that is about 20 -30 minutes from one end to the other. Our ambulance is stationed roughly in the middle of the territory. our people live all over the area and will respond direct to the scene unless they have to pass by the station en-route. We are generally able to have an EMT on scene several minutes faster than the ambulance providing definitive care, which is better for the pt's we serve. the cost of these units was raised by going out to the community and explaining the need for them which several donors stepped up to fund. It did not come from decreasing the amount of continuing education funding of other budget items. The same way we approached funding our purchase of an AUTOPULSE a year ago, which was the first in our state.

Now thats funny Marty

call the fire dept and have them pull a charged line to put a large fog pattern on the scene .We had just this exact incident last year when a 48 ' flatbed rolled over on an off ramp spilling an estimated 5 million highly upset bees loose. they will swarm away from the fog stream giving you time to remove your victims to the ambulance Remember to check everyone on the scene that has been stung for reaction to the venom as many will have multiple stings. the more stings the greater chance of a reaction.

You need to remember that these "TRUCKS" are designed with a 19,500 GVW so that contractors can have them mounted with dump bodies and such on them. They are much too stiff to be used for ambulance service. The same can be said for the international & freightliner chassis. does'nt matter if you have the air ride rear suspension added , they're still dump trucks. :evil: :evil:

If you want a quality ambulance without the high price of a braun try out a Medtech or a PL custom. Both are well built with a lot of thought put into how they will be used in the street. Our 1995 Medtech is going strong with minimal repair issues or electrical gremlins found in many other manufacturers trucks. Our next purchase this year will likely be a PL Custom due to the local sealer availability. Another quality truck is Demers out of Canada.

Dial away! :=]

very nice jeep!

Just be sure to leave the evil empire on good terms. you never know when you might need or want to be rehired. Working for a smaller family run service can be a nice change , but it can also have problems due to the closeness of the relationships between employees. GO for it. . >:-]

Yes you have to enlist!!! Dubya's running low on cannon fodder for his oil war.

NAH ! thats just a place for the old fire officers to take a nap.

All well and good , if you happen to have a paramedic within earshot. Many places DO NOT have one available within the travel time to the hospital. Yeah I know you have five minute travel time to multiple ER's. A lot of us have travel times over an hour in nice weather, and on a good day we might be able to intercept with a medic somewhere along the way ,OR not! In a perfect world every small town would have an ambulance on every street corner , staffed with two advanced care paramedics and a thoracic surgical team just in case they were needed , then the paramedics could sit up front & hold the steering wheel. OOPS i must have gotten into D D's meds.

Medic 8 +10 for a clear concise and kick-ass explanation that even our young AJ will have to think about

WOW !! where do I begin. First off you obviously have raging hormones that you can' seem to control. nothing wrong with that as long as you contain them until the proper time & place. Secondly it would seem that you have no problem stealing time from your employer, ie six calls in sixteen hours. I'll wager that if your paycheck was short an hour every shift that you would be screaming bloody murder. Next : the first time you were on your phone I would ask you to pay attention to your job, the second time i would not be so nice in asking you to shut your phone off. THE THIRD time I had to speak to you the phone would likely be taken from you & tossed out the window, hopefully to be run over. The last time i tossed a cell out the window the newbie {A} was in shock & {B} when we got back to the base he went screaming into the office to cry to the owner who promptly fired his arse . As far as helping someone reset their ambulance, it's a very nice gesture until something comes up missing & everyone starts looking at you because you didn't belong in their truck. If you last a while in this profession you might see that we are only telling you the truth. I only hope that you mature enough to understand what all of us are trying to tell you!!!! It's not that i don't understand having a good time or cutting someone a little slack , BUT there is a time + place for everything and work is not the place for you to spending an hour a day talking to your significant other. Besides phone sex is highly overrated

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! BEWARE of the EVIL EMPIRE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They will come to town and sell the politicians a carpet bag full of promises if only they are given the exclusive contract, then once they sign the deal in comes Darth Vader and the rest of his evil empire. nuff said!!! been there done that left the job for pastures without the empire

anytime Devin. we have written AFG grants four times + been successful once. it was for airpacks +a cascade system with a station based compressor. I do know of a few depts that qualified for apparatus grants, + all of them had a severe need to replace a 30+ year old engine or tanker that didn't meet NFPA regs. Happy grant writing .

I have to go along with medic RN on this one. in describing the scene , noting the existence of what appeared to be drugs at the scene of a "seizure" patient you are providing a possible cause to the M.D. What nobody has mentioned here is SCENE SAFETY . just because the FD is there doesn't make this a safe scene. back out call for PD & wait. then they can deal with the drugs, the criminal activity & watch my back for when his buds with the weapons come out of the back room.

Devin : the AFG program has a set of criteria that have to be figured into the formula. depending on the size of the population served you are required to match funds from 5% up to 20 % of the total cost for vehicle acquisition. the odds of getting a vehicle grant are much lower than getting a grant for health + safety training or equipment. Check out this forum for lots of grant info http://forums.firehouse.com/forumdisplay.php?f=355

I'm proud of ya dixie ! sounds like you prepped for the interview and went in with the right attitude. Good luck

before everyone starts packing their bags to move north of the border . Remember that the Canadian dollar exchange rate is around 35 % less than yank so a $ 1.oo Canadian is = to 1.35 yank. they also have a much higher GST and the cost of just about everything is a fair bit higher than here in the states. Not knocking it cause we love to spend time in the maritimes , our dollars go a lot farther.

Seems to me that the moron in charge of the training exercise forgot to explain to billy bob & bubba that they need to open the nozzle BEFORE they attempt to enter. The officer in charge should be brought up on charges. and doing it in front of a crowd with crying kids watching ,WTF. :roll: :roll: :roll:

I worked for a leasing agency back in the mid 80's. the pluses were that the service did all the hiring/ firing , they payed for all our benefits [minimal] our workers comp, vacations, were required to provide coverage for sick call outs etc. The agency charged 38% on top of our salary for this. For a while it was ok for us as we were making a little better pay, but the promises of better benefits and job + shift stability magically never appeared. All of this while the owner + his wife drove matching Mercedes Benz's. About six months later a new guy came into town + started up another agency with all the same promises. Plus he only charge 35% on top. customers dropped agency #1, + went with #2 guess what no one went to work for him + all but a few left the original. We figured we didn't need a pimp to drive around in a big car while we were busting our A$$ES making him money.

PRPG is correct : one of the reasons we require annual training & recert is to keep our insurance ratings , which translates into lower premiums than comparable departments. It also is a great way to remind every operator what the state statutes require of us in order to drive emergency vehicles. As risk manager it also allows me to observe such skills as backing + use of mirrors. sure a lot of it is repetitive but i found that the guy who kept mowing down cones while backing up through the course had a depth perception issue which after a trip to the ophthalmologist for care was resolved. he didn't realize there was a problem until the cone course. i kept wondering where all the scuffed sidewalls were coming from, now i know

Our state requires any regular operator of an ambulance to have taken the state certified 16 hour AVOC course before driving an ambulance . There is a waiver for those folks such as a firefighter or deputy who might be called upon to drive while the crew is working in the back such as a trauma or code call. Our department SOG's require all personnel who operate any dept. vehicles to also take a 12 hour annual driver training course. This applies to ambulances or fire trucks, and you must take + pass the cone course in every vehicle that you will be certified to drive. This course is following the guidelines from VFIS , our insurance carrier, who supply a complete training manual with videos + powerpoint presentations + written testing materials. They have an excellent risk management package of training programs available from their website. VFIS.com

Too funny hammer. didn't know you had K-mart north of the border. shouldn't it be : A woman went to a Canadian Tire service counter :-]