strippel

We have them on most of our vehicles, and is does save time. But not much. There are no Opticom controlled traffic signals in the city, only SOME of the outlying townships and boroughs have them.

The big issue is not assuming that you have control of the intersection. We have had occurances when there is an engine coming one way, and an ambulance another. If one or both don't pay attention to who actually has control of the intersection (ie: just checking the flashing white light, and not the green), it can cause problems. (Insert volunteer slam here).

I started many years ago with a volunteer 911 service. That turned into working for a private transport service, which did 90% scheduled and unscheduled IFTs, and about 10% 911 back up for a small city.

As my life changed, so did my jobs. After working inside the hospital, I transferred outside to a non-profit (quasi-hospital based) service. I worked there for years, running mostly city/country 911 calls, mixed with all the different transports you could think of. When I got my medic, the IFTs decreased for me, but increased for the service.

Now, I work for a government agency, and do not do IFTs with them. I am still part-time with the other agency, and get my share of IFTs. Ive been lucky. There are a few nursing home shuttles here and there, but most of mine now are for higher levels of care. The transports range from 1-4 hours one way, with a nurse, and some of the sickest patient's Ive ever seen.

I like the learning aspect of the "specialty" transports, but still remember my early days. It is just as important to talk with an other person, and hear about their life as it is to take care of the sickest of patients. Maybe just not as exciting. All deserve your respect and care.

It depends.

At my full time (government) we are "allowed" 30 minutes for a BLS call and 45 minutes for an ALS call. About half of that time is waiting on a bed and nurse. We have to hand write our pcr (sorry, report) before we leave. I have good partners, and the ambulance is usually ready within 5 minutes of getting a bed. Of course, I write while we are waiting. My average time is about 30 minutes.

At my part time, we are available as soon as the patient is off our litter. Hospitals are located in our district, and we do computerized charts back at station, or on the way back in the ambulance. Charts must be written within 24 hours. We rarely wait on a bed or a nurse, and have a station at the hospitals for restock.

Sorry I haven't been on in quite a while. I have been very busy with my new job.

But anyway...

The girl I'm seeing will be graduating paramedic school in the next 2 months. I am looking for a gift for her. I don't want to go with the standard new steth , t-shirts, or EMS jewelry.

If anyone has any ideas, please let me know.

Thank You.

Well...

I was registered for the full conference, but got a new job. I cancelled the registration, but still have my paid for room at The Marriot.

Good thing my new gig is in Balto, so I will be available for the meet-up.

I may also be getting back in for at least part of the conference.

Anyone wanting to share my room

I just left my parents house from our Christmas dinner, and stopped at the grocery store. As I was walking the isles aimlessly, looking for the few food items I needed, a gentleman walked up to me and said, "you don't remember me, do you?"

I stared at his face, and didn't recognize him. He said "I want to thank you". The man explained that he called 911 a few weeks ago, and I was out his house. As he talked, I remembered that he had been at his FMD, and diagnosed with pneumonia the day before. He called us with fever and profound dyspnea. The man stated that he had a long hospitalization, and after 5 weeks was recently allowed to go back to work. He was diagnosed with blood clots.

The man continued to thank me (my partner and our fleet person who happened to be in the area) for our help.

I am occasionally thanked after a call, but it has been a while since I was remembered like this. It felt nice.

This (and a few other events recently) allowed me to reaffirm my feelings on a career choice.

One night last tour, my partner and I got called for a specialty transport. Our hospital does not deliver babies at it's main location, and a (high risk) pregnant woman arrived in the EMD. We we called to take her to the Women's Hospital. We arrived, and the patient was in labor. We watched a baby being delivered. In the next room, an 8 year old boy was injured by a bull, and would be lucky to survive surgery. Nurse walks up and states how ironic it is, and just before Christmas.

Turns out the mother and baby are related to a coworker, and all are doing well. I have not heard how the child is doing.

A few years ago, our one fully paid fire department considered billing us (non-profit, quasi-hospital based) for assist calls. (Not crashes, but lift assists and the like. Serious calls that we are unable to back ourselves up).

Our management embraced that, then stated that the city would be billed for fire and police incident standbys. Also, we would bill the city for workmens comp for injured firefighters and police officers. That stopped very rapdily.

Since then, fire and police have been willingly responding on all possible cardiac/respiratory arrest calls.

Within the last 2 months, the fire cheif approached our managment, and wanted to respond on all ALS calls to keep firefighters active.

You believe she's really 30??

You are a sick little monkey.

Really, she is 30, been out drinking with her.

Dust, I'll add you to my friends.

I could tell you about my friend. When he was 21 he dated a 14 year old.

Eeewww. :snorting: :puke:

prpg now lives near me, and has been busy. I'm sure he'll be active again soon.

I have worked in vans for BLS 911, and recently ran a call as an ALS provider. I was assisting one of our BLS trucks. There was 1 EMT, an EMT student, the patient, and me. Needless to say, the student tried really hard to be part of the wall.

We only have 1 van left, and it's on the short list to leave.

(other than annual 'improvements', the rest of our 15 trucks are the same).

All ALS services are required to have a medical director.

BLS are supposed to, especially if they have AEDs (which they should), or give patient assisted meds, and Epi-pen

We rely on fee for service.

We are non-profit. A subscription drive is sent out every year, obviously it does not raise that much.

I'm not exactly sure, but I would bet we receive less than $40,000 in municipal support.

This year, we will do more than 30,000 events, about 60% of them are 911.

It was about 90 degrees, with 100% humidity, so I don't think "it" was keeping warm.

As far as the guy vs. gal, didn't take a close look. Could have been.

Yes, It did look like that. We have no zoos nearby. Are you missing one in NYC?

My partner and I were returning from our first call of the day... rapid afib (220+), hypotensive, and were just blocks from the hospital.

In an affluent residential area, a guy wearing a gorilla suit riding a skateboard.

we have our own EMT classes and Paramedic School. I didn't follow the changes in the paramedic school since I graduated (I am not a preceptor).

As far as EMT, our students are required to ride for 40 hours. They are assigned to a tenured staff EMT who is willing to give them the needed attention. Two of the assistant instructors ride full time, and frequently get students. All students must do assessments, vitals, and write a PCR on patient encounters. The PCR is reviewed by the crew, and handed in to the intructor.

I can't say I have, but it has happened. (About 3 years ago, I bumped another moving vehicle, no damage.)

Working in a old city, there are always signs, trees, mirrors, telephone poles, etc, in the narrow roadways.

My agency understands that, as long as you are honest. Now, if you were backing without a spotter and hit something....

I think you have too much free time.

I believe everyone should be responsible for their own actions.

If the cop finds you, then so be it. It is not for me to change destiny.

I'll send you an PM tomorrow when I have time.

We are currently hiring.

I'll tell you where not to work.

I haven't since I was in my early 20s.

I take that back. A couple of weeks ago, I was doing stuff around the house on my day off. I head a siren, and made the mistake of looking out the window. ALS (3rd due) was just arriving at a crash at the end of my block.

It was raining, so I grabbed the umbrella, and took a short walk. By the time I got there, the local BLS had the patients packaged, and were loading. Vol Fire was throwing the roof they cut off back on top of the car.

Stood there a minute, tried to figure out how a single car took out a telephone pole, and trapped people on a beautiful straightaway. I gave up, talked to the fire chief and cop (non-accident related stuff), then went home.

When I work, I go where they send us. If we are closer than one of our other trucks, we trade off, no stealing calls from other agencies. No buffing, whacking, or wacking on or off the clock.

Our time starts at dispatch.

We have no control over dispatching, as that is done by county government, and all EMS agencies are independent non-profit.

The county dispatching program, which we have access to, keeps track of when the phone rings, and then all associated unit times. Our charts have spaces for all those times. Our PI person does keep track, and makes charts and graphs.

There have been many times where the answer to dispatch times have been 2-5 minutes, which is totally unacceptable. Prior to advanced dispatching programs, experienced dispatchers hers could send out a call in about 45 seconds. As soon as the dispatcher could figure out the municipality, everything else was simple.

Now, all the information must be entered into the program, and it decides who to send. Only the computer can decide, due to ambulance and fire consolidations, and "closest available" ALS unit. So were are at the mercy of the dispatcher/typist. Also, the dispatcher has to ask all the questions on the flip cards, as they do priority dispatching and pre-arrival instructions.

We get "yelled at" if it takes more than 3 minutes to respond, but there are always extenuating circumstances. Main reason is very old low band radio dispatching. Many times, pagers will not activate inside the hospitals. Some dispatchers will place the ambulance available on arrival at the hospital (not good). Other dispatchers won't put you available when you call in (even worse). Actual responding times are not heavily criticized, as we can go blocks in the city, or miles in the country.

I'd love to have someone show up and do all my lifting for me.

Our EMS district covers multiple fire districts, each has it's own protocol. Most have nothing to do with EMS, which works just fine for me.

Some volunteer companies run a QRS squad on EMS calls. Some companies will only run on cardiac/respiratory arrest calls. Others throw in pedestrian struck calls, more as a benefit to the police.

Luckily, there is no racing, or fighting on scene, although there can be a lot of testosterone.

And another benefit, no fire department does ALS.

My partner and I had a probie with us. Got dispatched to an emotional problem about 2 blocks from our station. When we arrived, there was one police car on location, officer was typing on his computer. There is no history with the patient or the address, so the officer asked us to go first.

The patient's wife is standing on the front porch, and states that her husband has been under stress lately, and today he is "irrational". He has never been violent. The patient is standing in the back yard. We walk to the back yard, and have a pleasant conversation with the patient. Mid sentence, the patient stops, looks at the probie, and states "I am going to rip your head off". We say "thank you and have a nice day", and walk out front to talk with the officer.

The officer is talking with the patient's wife, another officer has arrived. The officer has the patient's phone in his hand, and is calling mental health. The patient comes running through his house to the front porch. He takes one look at the officer, and punches him in the face. My partner grabs the wife, I call for backup, the other officer runs up with his baton swinging.

The patient is larger than both officers, they are unable to control him. Luckily, more officers arrive quickly, and the patient is hand cuffed, and taken to the station.

Our supervisor arrives, and asks where our probie is. He has hidden in the ambulance, locked the doors, and is hiding on the floor, trying to squeeze under the litter.

Congrats!

I was there, and honestly, was not interested in buying anything. I went for the classes (need those NREMT-P hours.) The classes I thought were great, especially Gordon Graham and the closing keynote. I never laughed so much, and learned.

When I was downstairs, I was either with 1 friend who already knew many of the vendors, he was doing more networking (AKA looking for freebies). The rest of the time I spent with an ambulance sales rep. He was an old friend I haven't seen in a while. That, and his assistant was hot.

I did not spend much time talking with reps, and did not notice your stand. Sorry. I did spend some time talking to agencies that were hiring. You never know where life will lead you.

I hope you were able to get a cheap rate on a good hotel like I did.