Need Feedback

[erice2592]

Just wanted to get ideas from all over on what you guys do in class besides recite the textbook and do labs? Any EMS advances discussion? New treatment? New innovations in the EMS community? Case studies? I have a very cut and dry program. We go to class, read our book, and leave. Any insight would be helpful.

[uglyEMT]

On my recent recert class we talked alot about why we do the interventions we do instead of what we do. I know it helped some students out to understand why we do things, some of the more seasoned folks learned those things in the field so it helped the newer EMTs or those that just do IFTs.

We did have one session of case studies with difficult extrications or environments. Car overturned into a small creek, farmer unresponsive in a silo, machineist caught up in a lathe, electrician unresponsive up on a pole.

I will give you a personal case that I told the class and the instructor wrote down for further use and study. Very heavy snowfall (2+ feet) outside with drifts to chest height, home set back from the road 100 feet, unshoveled walk ways. 56yr old male post CABAGE complaining of pain in his left arm radiating to his chest. You and your partner arrive (both EMTs) ALS is in route but due to the conditions and the roads is likely 30 minutes away. A) How do you get to the patient. How do you get the patient to the rig.

What we did was basically swim to the front door through the drifts. Left the cot at the rig and used the backboard as kind of a sled. Patient was allowed to sit up for comfort on the board but for safety we strapped his legs down and slid him (partner behind the board for stability and pushing, used two spider straps attached to the front and over my shoulders to pull it) to the cot where we transfered him to the cot and off the board. Met ALS in route to the hospital yada yada yada.

Hopefully your class will get into scenario based labs and use real world examples that work your mind vs fulfilling a check list.

Hope this helps. If you have any other questions I would be glad to help. Especially with some real world cases of some pretty unlikely stuff. Its amazing what you get to see in rural EMS vs the big city type stuff.

[paramedicmike]

You can't really learn the advanced stuff until you learn the basic stuff. A lot of the basic stuff, even in a paramedic class, especially in a paramedic class, is book learning, studying and lab work. That's the way many educational programs work. That's the way your program works. I'm guessing you knew that when you decided to enroll in this particular program.

Ultimately, however, your education is what you make it. You need to do the book and lab learning before you can do the advanced topic learning. That being said, if you aren't using the resources available on this very discussion forum (where we have providers from all over the world, where we have things like case studies open for all members to discuss, where we have topic directed forums for innovations in EMS, news in EMS etc...) then you're, well, wrong.

Your cut and dry classroom work is only a small part of your education. It is up to you to use *all* of the resources available to you to increase your knowledge. So my advice to you, since you asked, is to get on the stick and start being more responsible (more than you currently are) about your education. Nobody's going to hand it to you. You gotta want it and work for it.

We're here to help.