Fight over ambulance leads to fight in Atlantic City....

[stone13]

Just my .02 but where I work the first one to call is the first one to be transported. If the parents came running up to the ambulance with a bleeding kid, sure we would have a look at him ( we run 3 to a truck here- 1 medic and 2 basics) but the Ped vs. car would get the transport, and we would call for a 2nd truck for the kid.

[spenac]

Transporting 2 unrelated patients (when it's not an MCI situation)? What ever happened to patient privacy?

I have carried many unrelated patients. They want care they give up some rights. I have literally gone from one house to another, to another, etc. All loaded with me alone to do treatment. Thats life in rural EMS. No other ambulance and 90 miles to hospital you do whats needed.

[DwayneEMTP]

Gotcha FSB...I don't have any experience in B/B systems so I have a hard time getting there in my brain....Though I'm not sure that that would change this equation much.

Screw the kid. He doesn't need an ambulance. He needs a Kotex for his head, and for his parents to do their job and drive him to the ER.

This from the guy that shredded 96 people (at least) for calling a ped seizure stable? :shock:

In my little brain the ped head injury trumps. Should his folks have taken him to the ER on their own? Probably, but it depends on the injury. Heads bleed and freak folks out, but that doesn't mean it wasn't more than that.

And we never really got the info about if the ambulance was even called, or if it just happened on the accident.

The pedestrian with the unfortunate girly name needs immobilisation and horizontal transportation, as well as medical assessment to determine his condition.

Again, from the guy that promotes no immobilization without intelligent assessment? He needs assessment, you bet, but the odds are that he doesn't need anything more than that. Is he going to get more than that? Likely, because he needs his documentation for court. Perhaps your experience is showing the numbers work another way though.

Am I saying that he has less right to care than the bleeding kid? It depends on assessments should this be/become a triage situation, as it would be if the ambulance wasn't in fact called, right?

I've only had perhaps a dozen veh/ped calls. Three of them somewhat serious. In those three the drivers of the vehicles were pretty traumatized to have hit a pedestrian. They made no attempt to belittle the accident. (As the driver is doing here)

In the others it was clear that we were simply transporting to create the docs the victims wanted to have available when they went to court.

Unless you're making the argument that they should have ignored the kid because they were called to the accident, I don't really get where you're coming from....

Dwayne

[DwayneEMTP]

Transporting 2 unrelated patients (when it's not an MCI situation)? What ever happened to patient privacy?

I didn't think of that. Though I as well have taken several unrelated patients that were all going to the same hospital. I'm not sure of the HIPAA issues here....(Edit: I meant unrelated to each other, but from the same MVC)

I have literally gone from one house to another, to another, etc.

And there weren't even any sick people there...he was just looking for snacks for the 90 mile drive!

Dwayne

[JPINFV]

I don't think there's enough information here to determine if either the original call (car vs pedestrian) or the still alarm (kid meets fence) should be transported. A part of me wants to tell the kid and the kid's parents to "Buck up Nancy, find some paper towels and drive him yourself." While head and face wounds tend to bleed more than normal wounds, it they generally don't approach life threatening.

[Dustdevil]

A part of me wants to tell the kid and the kid's parents to "Buck up Nancy, find some paper towels and drive him yourself." While head and face wounds tend to bleed more than normal wounds, it they generally don't approach life threatening.

That's pretty much my point. Of course, all I have to go on is what is posted here, which we all know may or may not be accurate. That's a given. But with that given, a forehead lac from fence wire isn't an emergency.

As for the drama queen pedestrian, unfortunately we have to play his game since we have no way of reliably determining if it is a game or not. Painful distracting injuries are a qualifier for immobilisation. If this guy is laying there and screaming for his lawyer, there is no way for me to rule out injury, so he gets immobilised. That'll teach him.

[spenac]

I didn't think of that. Though I as well have taken several unrelated patients that were all going to the same hospital. I'm not sure of the HIPAA issues here....(Edit: I meant unrelated to each other, but from the same MVC)

And there weren't even any sick people there...he was just looking for snacks for the 90 mile drive!

Dwayne

SHHHHH Don't want the boss to find out about that. :twisted:

[medic14527]

Ive been in ems for 15 yrs. if you have 2 bls techs each one should evaluate one of the patient to see who is more seriously injured and go from there

[CBEMT]

Painful distracting injuries are a qualifier for immobilisation. If this guy is laying there and screaming for his lawyer, there is no way for me to rule out injury, so he gets immobilised. That'll teach him.

Other than the screaming for lawyers, that was half my calls this week. :? I gave out more morphine this week than the last 4 months. Trauma centers are a little more liberal with orders apparently. :wink:

[HellsBells]

My lands folks, city ambulances are so spoiled. Just load them both. And take anybody else thats on the way. Still plenty of room when both are BS calls. It's not that difficult for one medic to take care of two or more basic patients. I like having multiple patients, it keeps me from getting so bored.

In your rural area, spenac, I know your the only game in town. In the city I'd have to call for a backup unit, as the kid would have to be transported to the childrens hospital, no point in driving all over town to drop two patients off, even if they are both BS.