researching possibilties. looking for insights.

[jaybird8]

i am going to start my training this year. i have wanted to for a long time but am now getting cold feet, sort of. i like life in a large city. right now i am in atlanta. i would like to move to new york next year if possible. then i may want to come down to ga and work on an ambulance while taking undergrad college courses. coming from a more experienced point of view, i want to know if this sounds reasonable or totally insane? even if i have to exclude the nyc part.

if i put in the extra time and effort to be a paramedic after working emt for a while, would it be possible or logical to work part time, or in summers while taking a regular class load?

i want to hear peoples stories. how much do you really appreciate this job/career as opposed to being stuck? is the pay a decent living wage for a single person? do you feel like this work takes too much out of you to concentrate on anything else? or do you feel like it is good for transitional periods? is the experience worth it just for the things you'll learn and carry with you? do you wish you had gone another route? if so, why? your opinions and elaborations welcome. my eyes and ears are open. more questions burried somewhere, but for now i will await your replies.

[Lone Star]

Having worked EMS in metro Detroit, I can say this...first off, you'll probably be relegated to doing alot of non emergency transfers, which will give you a good chance to hone your basic skills, and bedside manor. You'll get your 'trauma junkie calls' but they wont be as many as the 'routine transfers'.

Depending on the company you work for, you may be able to pick up open shifts, (the company I worked for used to page out the open shifts as soon as they were open)

Having said that, I have to honestly admit that working in Detroit taught me alot of things, not only as a health care provider, but things in general.

I don't see a 'problem' with your plans to work and go to school to advance in your license level, just dont try to do too much all at once...burnout is a bitch!

Never stop striving to learn, as you will never 'know it all' in EMS!

Good luck in your travels in the EMS world!

[jaybird8]

thanks to you for your help.

[Dustdevil]

i am going to start my training this year. i have wanted to for a long time but am now getting cold feet, sort of. i like life in a large city. right now i am in atlanta. i would like to move to new york next year if possible.

Whoa... slow down there, Bird! You are definitely overloading yourself with a lot of decisions that you don't need to be concerning yourself with yet. Where you're going to work first? Where you're going to work second? Where you're going to move to? First things first. Let's get your education out of the way before you start looking for jobs.

• 1. Education

2. Location

3. Education

4. Job

5. Education

6. Career changes

Ummm... no. College courses come BEFORE working on an ambulance, not during or after. This is brain surgery you are talking about performing, not carpet cleaning. Would you want somebody with no education learning medicine OJT while your mother is the patient? Of course not. Establish a solid educational foundation before you start taking human lives into your hands for fun and profit.

coming from a more experienced point of view, i want to know if this sounds reasonable or totally insane? even if i have to exclude the nyc part.

Of course, any desire to live in NYC is a symptom of a qualified insanity. A desire to move there just to work FDNY is a symptom of watching too much Turd Watch. But hey... whatever makes you happy. NYC, Atlanta, Detroit, whatever, so long as you give one hundred percent to being the very best you can be. Every system needs good people.

if i put in the extra time and effort to be a paramedic after working emt for a while, would it be possible or logical to work part time, or in summers while taking a regular class load?

It is not logical to work as an EMT for awhile before beginning your paramedic education, unless you are truly unsure that you really want to do this for a career. In that case, a little exposure ahead of time may be helpful to your decision process. But don't let anybody tell you that EMT experiences "for awhile" is helpful to your being a good paramedic in the future. It's nonsense. You shouldn't start any career not knowing wtf you are doing, and then try and go back and learn after the fact. You darn sure shouldn't do that with human lives.

As for going to medic school while working as an EMT, it is going to depend on the school you are attending, as well as the organisation you are working for. It will also, of course, depend upon how good of a student you are. Look back at your high school experience for a clue. Did you have to bust your arse studying to make passing grades, or did the educational process come pretty naturally to you? Were you the kind of student who put in more effort than was required to simply pass so that you could excel, or did you just do what was necessary to get by? What kind of shifts does your (future) employer work you? Do they work you on 24 hour shifts? Then forget it. You'll play hell trying to attend Monday-Wednesday-Friday classes with Tuesday-Thursday labs and clinicals while working 24 hours shifts. Does your (future) paramedic school have classes only every third day in order to cater to the firemonkeys? Then forget it if your employer has you working 12 hour shifts everyday. Every employer and every school runs things a little differently, so these questions are going to be very location specific. But these uncertainties are just another reason why you should get your educational foundation done BEFORE entering the field. Very few people who enter the field first every go back and get the job done right. Working too many hours. Working erratic hours. Working overtime because their pay sucks. It’s just very hard to make it work.

i want to hear peoples stories. how much do you really appreciate this job/career as opposed to being stuck?

Everybody -- and I mean EVERYBODY -- who enters EMS as a career faces a certain amount of disappointment and disillusionment. It's not as cool and exciting as a television show. In fact, it is so little like any television show you have seen that you will be surprised once you get in. Every run you make is not a critical trauma case that lets you use your education and training as well as your lights and sirens. In fact, nine out of ten runs you make are total bull$hit. And nine out of the ten patients you have that do require your education and training will not benefit from your efforts because they are too far gone to begin with. You start feeling useless pretty quickly, unless you're stupid enough to fool yourself into believing you are more important than you really are. And that illusion only lasts so long. The pay sucks. The hours suck. The career options suck. Half of your co-workers suck. Three quarters of your supervisors suck. The potential for advancement sucks. And the potential for ever retiring with a pension is non-existent. The truth is, there is very, very little about EMS that is positive. What keeps the professionals going is the promise of a better future, and the desire to be a part of the force for change. What keeps the others going is the fact that they are too stupid and lazy to get a real education and go do anything else. Unfortunately, they outnumber the professionals by about 3 to 1.

is the pay a decent living wage for a single person?

Are you looking for a career, or just a temporary job while you decide what you want to do when you grow up? If you are looking for a professional career, then you need to immediately start thinking long term. You will not (for your sake) be single forever. But on the current average EMS salary in this country -- especially in cities with a horrendous cost of living like NYC or Atlanta -- you will never be ready to comfortably provide for a family. There are, of course, exceptions. But they are few and far between and very, very competitive. Again, a lot of us are working hard to change that in the future. And if the new generation of medics get on board with professionalism from the get-go, we can indeed change things. But I certainly wouldn't look for any significant improvement in the next 5 to 10 years.

do you feel like this work takes too much out of you to concentrate on anything else?

Only if you let it. EMS is not a calling, a hobby, or a lifestyle. It is a job just like any other job. You clock in, and you clock out. Then you're done. Except for always continuing your education, the rest of your time off is the same as anybody else's. Raise a family. Travel. Tend a garden. Play music. Play paintball. Whatever. Just don't take the job home with you and your life will remain yours. But if you insist on hurting yourself and the profession by being a volunteer whacker somewhere in your off time, then yes... it will consume you.

or do you feel like it is good for transitional periods?

No. Absolutely not. It is a profession. It should be treated as such. Again, it is not a hobby or something to do until you decide what you want to be when you grow up. In order to do the job justice, you need two years of full time education to even sit in the ambulance. That's too much commitment for a transition. And if it is too much commitment for you, then please move on.

is the experience worth it just for the things you'll learn and carry with you?

I'm not sure what you mean. If you are asking if it is worthwhile to work as an EMT for a couple of years just for fun, without any interest in an EMS career, just so you'll have some neat stories to tell, or the slim chance that you might actually need that experience someday, then the answer is no. In fact, the large number of people who pass through EMS with those sorts of intentions are one of the main reasons we fail to grow as a profession.

do you wish you had gone another route? if so, why?

Absolutely! I wish I had the benefit of hindsight to guide me through my professional development. I wish I had somebody who had spent thirty years navigating this professional minefield to advise me on the things to concentrate on and the things to avoid without mincing words. Unfortunately, EMS was about 2 years old when I started, so I had to learn all this crap the hard way. The VERY hard way.

your opinions and elaborations welcome. my eyes and ears are open. more questions burried somewhere, but for now i will await your replies.

Plus 5 for asking serious questions before taking the plunge. When you get into EMT school, you will be surprised how many people in there haven't done the first bit of career research. They don't know if or where they might find an EMT job. They don't know how much it pays. They don't know what the professional future is. All they know is blood and sirens are cool. Then they come here asking these questions after about three months of not being able to find a job. Kudos to you, and good luck!

[CaneMedic]

wow I'm glad I read that reply. A couple minutes of my life I won't get back.

Some if it's true. And some of it screams BURNOUT!