stcommodore

Morale of the story you probably should have worked through this with the guy first.

Well considering that under the dispatch catergory of "Sick" we have "hungry" then I'd guess we would have to take this patient to the hospital. Oh, and what else falls under sick? "Can't Sleep", "Can't Walk", "Hungry", "Earache", "Headache-with no critical symptoms", "extremity cramps", need I go on?

So whats with LEDs being so hard to see in the am? Does anyone miss the rotation sounds of the old lights?

I am probaby the biggest candy man in my city but if I gave pain medication to everyone who said "I want something for X pain" I'd have to be piss tested for suspected abuse. Nothing is more frustrating as calling command for orders or out of courtasy and they give the standard two or four of morphine. EXCUSE me this patient weighs 150 kg!

They think they can do it all, with a declining budget at that! The last few warm days we were averaging 4200 calls a day, Even in a city with 250+ ambulances, that's still a lot of calls per unit! It is actually overwhelming, too often we hear on the radio, "any units available in the borough I have 5 priority assignments holding, and a total of 12 holding" Had there been more units available this problem would not have occurred.

Or our equivlant engine company/first responders being dispatched on "medical assignments" in otherwards there are no suquads avail. It's not unheard of for this to happen at night when we work with nearl half the squads they have in the day. But we have run out of squads on multiple occasions during the day shift. My first call last night was easily 10-12 miles from my station, so knowing your "local" is impossible when your local is "river to river and airport to airport" aka the entire city.

No system is perfect, and when you run hundreds of thousands of calls mistakes happen. My urban system has gps in the front line ems units, and a mapping program on your toughbook shows your location and the grid of the city.Between the two EMS zone dispatchers is a 50in flat screen with all EMS units and different EMS incidents on the screen. In the future they plan "routing" into the system but like I said nothing is perfect.

what is the point of the pulse ox wave form. Either the number is good, or its not. I don't rely on sp02 that much to begin with.

In my county system the dispatcher replies back "___ confirm your 10-75" and if you don't answer after three broadcast they send help. In the city its "___ are you declaring an emergency." As people said before it gives you an open carrier without having to press the mic for 15 seconds, and alerts one if not all the dispatch terminals in the communication center. I think some new radios have the feature that give your gps location when this feature is used. I think any emergency system over the radio is dependent on you and your partner having and carrying your radio!

In addition to police in my city system you also recieve the fist due Engine, Ladder, Fire Batallion Chief and EMS Officer for an "assist." I guess its under the asumption that if the police don't arrive first there are now 11 more people to keep you from getting your ass further kicked.

Let me add to this a slightly different situation...

You are on the scene of a minor/moderate patient and two blocks away another minor/moderate patient is sitting on scene with a First Responder crew as there are no more abulances avail. Do you save the system/offere to save the world and pick up both or continue on your assignment?

When you turn on your moniter what is your default screen? I've seen a variation of II, III, avF, or II, sp02, c02. What does your service use and why?

"agressive public education" doesn't work. The goverment has spent how much on the census and still had issues? System abusers don't read the newspaper, and most don't read so I don't have a solution besides "you call we haul."

We already have card readers for drivers licences...

We all know people call cause they dont have a car, dont want to walk 5 blocks, have welfare so there is no bill, need I go on?

I've been known to show up at the "fire communications center" with ice cream somedays. Or get in arguments with a dispatcher on other times she works my band.

So under the "you cause it you pay it" theory I wreak a $250,000 GMC 4500/Horton my department should make me pay for that?

I once brushed/swiped a college police car with the driver side rear/diamond plate area of my squad. There was no damage to the squad that you could tell, in fact there are so many dings, scraps, dents, etc that it would take alot to notice another! The police car being brand new had a minor scuff mark(s) on it. My punishment...20 hours suspention.

My biggest issue with my department is that they never repair simple, minor, moderate body/paint damage to a squad. I feel like if you take money out of my pocket for my mistake then you should make it even and fix the unit. It's really a presentation and morale issue.

So I guess whoever gave me the negitive comment didn't get my attempt at humor. If you have any doubt run an EKG, but be a health care provider not a drone.

I'm 24 my partner is 31...no problems.

Lame, this is clearly a slow service with to much free time. Its just a curb...you should see the rims on my squad running 7,600 calls a year.

Why did you do an ekg on a rotting corpse?

It all depends on your systems resources. If you have enough squads to handle the call volume, or more then necessary you probaby wouldn't need a "set" meal break.

The problem in my EMS system is that we work either day or night shifts 8a-8p, 8p-8a. So everyone that comes in for night has typically already had a meal, but doesn't mean a crew wouldn't want a break but its slightly different then a day shift. Along the same lines our union wanted to fight for crews that work 12 hour units to be paid 15-20min prior to the shift when they are checking there rig. My point was working a 24 hour unit, we don't get the time to check the squad between shifts most times, and second would be giving more pay to a small percent of the work force.

During our current contract talks we considered pushing this as an issue but decided against it. I work in a busy urban system and working during a daywork you must find a creative way to get back to the station for luch, buy luch, etc. We are given "30 min" once your at the hospital before they call you but most good medics don't use that time and cover there calls. The fact is in an understaffed system that always runs close to or at capacity I don't know how we could have a "lunch break" policy.

Anybody from FDNY, or other big systems out there...do you have a break policy and if so how does it work?

The security function/system is the solution. I can't imagine a unit spec'ed without one. It's just a matter of using it!

While the squad should be locked at all times, our narcs are in our 1st in bag unsecured.

I had 17 calls last night in 12 hours...

Lets not forget police have the right to "recall" us, and if they say were not needed we often difer to them.