DWAYNE PASSED! HE IS A PARAMEDIC!!! WHOO HOOOOO...

[AMESEMT]

CONGRATULATIONS!!! I am following in your foot steps! I start clinicals on Monday at 3pm! Any advice from the now official paramedic to the paramedic student? Again, congratulations!

Ames

[DwayneEMTP]

Thanks all!

My advice, for what it's worth...

If you haven't started class yet, get right with your family.

We walked tonight for graduation, and when the president of the college announced that the students receiving degrees would be next he asked for some quiet. He then spent a few minutes explaining that he was proud of the students, but that getting an advanced education is very much a team sport for most of us. He then asked the entire stadium to stand and give a round of applause to the families of the students....And every student and family member there knew exactly what he was talking about. It was way cool.

For that last two years I've dedicated a minimum of four hours/day to study. I went to work, went to class, and then went into my office to study. Babs did EVERYTHING else. If she'd not been on board for this, I don't believe I could have done it. It was too hard.

Make sure your family knows what you're in for, that you need this time to excel, and then put your head down and demolish every class.

For clinicals, I'd simply ask that you make them valuable, and if they're not do ANYTHING to change yourself, your preceptor, or your location until they do. I wasted my whole first phase because I was a wuss and allowed myself to be beat up on every shift. And then I wasted half of my second phase regaining the confidence I'd forfeited on my first.

You need to be there to learn. Learn from the medic, from the basic, from the Docs and nurses. Make sure you have questions prepared and written down for the slow times during the shift, and ask any as they come up. I had a thing that I liked. When the preceptor asked me a question that I didn't know the answer to, I wrote it down in the little notebook I kept in my pocket. Then when I got home I would research it and write a paper on it and turn it into my preceptor on the next shift for review. My preceptors didn't demand this, in fact my first preceptor simply tore them up each time I gave them to her, but over time they seemed to stop seeing it as kiss ass behavior and respected it as a true desire to learn.

My third phase preceptor started asking me questions about anything he wasn't really strong on, and then would put my paper in a folder that he'd study from when things were slow...

And be prepared to make things better when you find them lacking. You can make a difference. I kept pursuing the issue of my first phase, not just my treatment but patinet care as well, finally talking to the medical director of the area, and recently heard through the grapevine that both the medic and basic that I had issues with have been fired.

Not what I was looking for, but they earned it, and now have been paid in full it seems.

This is your education. DEMAND that it is first rate. Good luck to you both!! Your posting history here leaves every reason to believe you'll make me look like a dancing monkey before you're done! In fact, I'm rooting for you to make it so.

Dwayne

[AMESEMT]

Dwayne - Thanks for the advice. I like the paper idea, I may have to borrow that from you! Sounds like you suffered through and persevered and you ended up on top! From what I have seen in your posts you will do great as a medic! Do you have a job already lined up or are you already working for a service? Good luck and thanks!

Ames

[Flasurfbum]

Congratulations!!!

I can only imagine how you feel right now, but I DO know the feeling of overwhelmingness. (I think I just made a word... 8) )

Double Congrats for the degree! I hope to start mine just as soon as I leap this hurdle known as Medic school....

[rogue medic]

Congratulations.

Don't worry about the screen name. A good medic never stops being a basic EMT.

You always have that to fall back on.

Get to know your medical director as well as you can. The medical director will let you know when you are being too much of a nuisance. The really good ones can almost always make time for you.