Undecided...

Just got home from my last shift. Last night I sat down and re-read everything that I had written in the past. Now I sit here with my iPad in front of me wondering where to begin. I honestly don't have a clue. So much has happened in the last two years it's rather daunting when I stop to thnk about it. I also took the opportunity to look over my reading list of other bloggers. It seems that I'm not the only one who's been MIA, several others have stopped writing as well. Be that as it may, I wish them well in their endevours.

Over the past 2 years I've seen a lot of changes, both in myself and in EMS. Personally, my daughter was born, I've gotten divorced, met someone else and fallen in love again, gained hopefully a little wisdom in both of those areas but by no means am I an expert in either. Professionally, I'd have to say the same. The fundamentls havent changed but ive seen two total protocol changes, lots of meds have left and new ones hace taken their place and the same with equipment. I'm considered a senior medic now with my service, only 3 others on my shift have more time in. I'm still teaching and I still love it. I've found a definite calling in being an instructor. It seems as though I'm fairly decent at it, if you take the students and staff comments and add in pass rates. I've also participated in 2 state and regional paramedic competitions, I'll be writing about those experiences later on.

All in all, I feel like I've hit my stride in life. Sure, there are still quite a few things on my list of stuff I want to accomplish, but I'm a little more patient now and all things come to those who wait, or sonthy say. Till next time...

BRM

Long time coming

Wow, it's been a long time since I've even taken a look at this blog. For whatever reason I've been thinking about it for the last few days. So today I read through all of my old posts and had a little reflection time. Thinking about all that has happened in the past few years. I reckon I might try this writing thing again and see how it goes.

BRM

Trauma...

OK, I know I haven't posted in forever but I got to put my two cents in on this new show "Trauma." I've been reading other posts, websites and NBC's site and this show is getting a lot of shit. I don't understand what the problem is.

Yea, OK it's not exactly realistic. Every episode so far is packed with some kind of MCI and you got medics doing outlandish stuff that most people in this job never see or do. But guess what? It IS TV! What show on the air is true to life? Do you think anyone would actually tune in to see a crew doing granny totes, sick calls and dialysis runs for an hour? Hell no they wouldn't.

Now, what about other TV shows out there that are emergency or medical based like Rescue Me, ER and House? Does anyone think that everything that happened on ER was true to life? I saw false intubations, doctors defib asystole and many other things. Yet, that show went on forever and was critically acclaimed.

How about Rescue Me? I love that show and I've been a fireman for 15 years. Yet it portrays us in a completely negative way. That show is nothing but drinking, drugs, screwing, adultery, abusing, murdering, lying and cheating with a few fires thrown in for good measure and it has been on the air for several years.

And House? I love that show too, never miss an episode. But does the public think that every doctor is like House? Does the public or anyone for that matter think that medical professionals act that way in the hospital? I would have to say no, they realize that it is TV.

The next beef I have is with people wishing there would be a new "Emergency" with ole Johnny and Roy or their comparing Trauma to Emergency. Have any of these people actually seen Emergency? Johnny and Roy were always going to some major wreck, heart attack, something blowing up or falling in. Granted, I wasn't around back then, but my dad was and he said that was bullshit back then just like it is today. So stop comparing everything to Emergency.

Another one that most people love was Mother, Jugs and Speed. I agree it was a great movie, but what happened in that one? An EMT accused of having dealings with drugs, another that smoked weed and the star drinking while driving on shift. Plus sex in the back of the rig, yet people loved that movie.

One other show that still comes on Discovery was "Paramedics." A reality show based on us. Even they just showed the juicy stuff, and very little of routine day to day.

I just don't get it. I'm kinda glad that we finally got a show of our own. They cancelled the last one "Saved." I wish people would shut the hell up so maybe this would might stick around for more than one season. There are a ton of cop shows and very few fire or EMS shows.

Just remember, it's TV! Not reality!

BRM

Another Great Read....

...and very educational too.

Prehospital 12 Lead ECG

Enjoy...

BRM

Vindicated...

Ran into a bit of trouble a while ago. All over a damn refusal...

Got a call for a CVA. We get there and this guy ain't having a stroke. All he had was numbness on one side of his leg, which he had a history of. His grand daughter was there, freaking out and she was the one who called us. He didn't want to go, he didn't want her to call 911. So of course he refused. He let us take his vitals and do a stroke screen on him. All were normal. We let him and his granddaughter know that he hadn't been examined by a physician and that we could not tell him definitively that he wasn't having a stroke and that we would be happy to take him to the hospital. He refused all of that. He was obviously competent and he was now informed of his condition. I felt he had every right to refuse further care and transport. So he signed my paper and we left.

About 3 hours later we get called to the local band-aid station for an emergency transport to the big city hospital for a stroke transfer. We get there and it's him. The charge nurse is pissed and she doesn't even give us a report, just points us towards the bed. We walk over and talk to him. The patient has no clue that he is being transferred or why. He said he only came to the hospital to shut his granddaughter up. We load him up and start towards the truck. That's when the nurse grabs my arm and tells me that the patient should have been transported from the scene and she will be making a complaint for further investigation about the situation. My reply was "OK" and we continued to transport.

Later that day the quality assurance guy from our service comes to call on us. He asks what happened, he already had a copy of my report so I told him that it was all there. He wanted to know more, so I pretty much told him the same thing that I had typed. In a round about way, he accused me of selling the refusal or encouraging the patient to refuse. Well that pissed me off and I let him know it. I asked him if he and everyone else in management didn't trust my judgment as a paramedic, then why in the hell was I out there on the road? Why was I able to function as a medic at all if he was going to question everything that I did? He finally left. The next day the charge nurse came to me and apologized for her actions. I accepted and I thought that was that. I was wrong.

Apparently he and the charge nurse are good buddies and he wasn't about to let it go. The next week I was at the office and he calls me into his little corner. He shows me a customer service questionnaire that he says that he sent to the patient about that call. He said that he had made this little form up some time ago but had never sent it to any patient so far. So this would be the first. Well, I start to get pissed all over again, but I managed to keep my cool. I asked him if he was going to start sending these out on a regular basis. He said no. I asked if he was even going to send them out randomly, he said no again. His explanation was that the budget wouldn't allow for it. Bullshit I thought. So I asked, "This is the only survey that you have ever sent out and the only one you're ever going to send out?" He just looked at me and I just about lost it. I turned to walk out and over my shoulder I said, "This sounds a whole hell of a lot like discrimination to me." I kept walking before he could reply.

I left the office steaming. I felt like this was a fucking head hunt and my head was on the chopping block. I also found out that the patient in question got sent home the same day, actually within a few hours of us taking him there. He wasn't having a stroke. I guessed our Q/A guy found that out and it just pissed him off that much more, since I was right about the patient. But that didn't change the fact that I had pissed off his buddy.

Well a couple of weeks go by and I get an email. It's the survey, apparently the patient had filled it out and sent it back in. It contained an excellent review of my care, on both calls; the refusal and the transport. It even had a handwritten comment saying how good the care was. I think I laughed out loud when I read it. It must have put a burr in his ass to get that back in the mail.

So now I am fully vindicated...

BRM

Great Reads...

Two new blogs I recently happened upon. They've been around a while, but I'm...well...a little slow..

Pink, Warm and Dry

Paramedicine 101

Transferred...

In my three short years working for my current employer I have now worked at every station. They call me the shift whore. I am usually the one that has to move around when a Medic is needed to work with an Intermediate or Basic. But now a co-worker has been injured and my semi-permanent station is the farthest from civilization that you can get in our county. It's over an hour to the nearest major hospital from our response area and that's going emergency traffic.

We also get the fewest calls of all the stations. That in itself isn't so bad, I get plenty of time to sleep, work on lesson plans for my teaching, read and stare at the walls. When we do get a call it usually takes about 3 hours to get back to the station.

Yesterday we traveled through 4 different counties, not counting our own and went to 5 different hospitals for a total of 7 calls. Most of them were bullshit, one actually needed to go. That one was a bad breather. Her house was sweltering and her rain-barrel girth and permanent growth in the shape of a cigarette glowing at the end of her fingers certainly didn't help. I wanted to tell her this but didn't, just put her on O2, loaded her up, gave her a few nebs and listened to her talk in a raspy voice for the 78 minute transport.

Anyways....I reckon that's enough bitching for the time being...Till next time..

BRM