Coheed1121

Ok thank you for missing the point of my post entirely. I don't know if you're trolling or just that woefully ignorant. I an not debating the virtues of the ppd test. I am merely questioning the legality of mandating the test and saying it is law from OSHA when all the evidence I have found says it's obviously recommended but not mandated.

I work for a private EMS company in Connecticut. I was recently told I need to have a ppd test done for an annual TB test. I have no problem getting the test done and plan on getting it done this week. I do have a problem being told I have no choice in the matter. Its not in our company policy, I was told it's a federally mandated OSHA regulation. I was also told I cannot refuse it under the OSHA law. I've looked online at the OSHA site and on this site too and did not find anything about it being mandatory and especially about not being able to refuse it. I called my regional OSHA office and was told that OSHA has no mandates about ppd screening. I mentioned to this to my companys training division and was told that whoever I talked to is wrong. So can anyone shed some light on this for me? Again I'm not debating getting the screening done. I always do it and do it annually. I just don't like being told I have no choice in the matter.

From googleing this topic i found out some info but as to what it really is i found its patent and it explains it the best so far, http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6887199.html It is supposed to be used in conjunction with a CT scan to confirm what the BAM is showing because it measures intracranial blood flow and pressure non-invasively. It is also supposed to be relativly compact and esy to set up.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5106598.stm Here are some quotes from this article: 'The device would first use ultrasound imaging technology, in particular "Doppler ultrasound", to locate internal bleeding. This employs a physical phenomenon known as the Doppler effect to look for a characteristic signature of bleeding vessels. It would then deliver a focused beam of high-powered ultrasound to those sites in order to cauterise the damaged vessels. ' "This is a pretty serious effort. These groups are working on making this an autonomous system that any soldier, or first responder, could use in an emergency," said Lawrence Crum, a member of the team headed by Philips and an engineering research professor at the University of Washington, Seattle. 'Ultrasound stops bleeding partly by heating the damaged area and partly through mechanical effects. The heating produced when this energy is absorbed prompts an insoluble protein called fibrin to precipitate from blood, forming a network of fibres that promotes clotting and plugs the wound. Heating also denatures the blood vessel's connective tissue (collagen) which helps form mechanical plugs and thermally "welds" tissue. One mechanical effect is called streaming; the high intensity beam pushes blood away from the injury, either back into the vessel itself or to the sides. In addition, the pressure changes induced by ultrasound lead to the formation of bubbles in the blood - an effect known as cavitation. This in turn may lead to the formation of free radicals - highly reactive charged molecules - which accelerate the clotting process. ' I just wanted to know what some of you thought of this and whether or not you think it would be practical in a prehospital setting. I bring this up because i just brought in my first case of definite internal bleeding and wanted to know if there were any treatments other than invasive surgery?

Me and my partner had just started to prepare the stretcher in the ED parking lot when it started to pour. About fifteen minutes later when we cleared the hospital this is what we ran into. This is a link to a couple other pictures, http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/coheed1121/my_photos Keep in mind these were taken from the passengers seat of a moving ambulance with a camera phone. A normal 15 minute return trip took over an hour and 45 minutes.