Emergency!

Update...

Mon, 20 Aug 2007 17:19:17 GMT

I just wanted to update my blog... I'm now half way through paramedic school... and boy has it been a struggle. I'm suppose to graduate May 2008... can't wait for that day to come.

Hospital Clinicals

Wed, 18 Apr 2007 02:32:55 GMT

We're now starting our hospital clinical for paramedic school. My first one was on Monday. I was in the I.C.U. It's the critical care area of the hospital... a place where some of the patients with the worst injuries and illnesses are sent to recover. Over the course of the day I spent my time focusing on 3 patients. One patient with a pulmonary embolism, another with a flail chest, and one woman suffering from a diabetic acidosis. The rest of the week I'll be in the ER.

First Shift as a Paramedic Student

Thu, 12 Apr 2007 19:06:40 GMT

My first shift as a paramedic student was exciting. I've been in class since Jan. now and we've so far finished up fundamentals, patient assessment, airway, IV and med route, and pharmacology. My instructors decided to let us do an ambulance clinical just because we didn't have anything else to do I guess. Our ambulance rides really don't start until August. But anyways... It felt good being in charge and having to make so many decisions... I really enjoyed it. We had a cardiac arrest... so I got to intubate (or try... I missed) and push drugs. We also had a seizure... in which I was put in charge of that scene. I haven't worked on an ambulance in 6 weeks now... besides the clinical, so I was starting to miss it. Now I'm in the process of starting another job. And I got called in to work Saturday where I use to work full time... so it'll be good to see the old crew again. I miss working there. As far as school goes we're starting hospital clinical next week. We'll be doing that for the rest of this semester. Then, during the summer we will start cardiology (one of the subjects I find most interesting).

Goin' Fishin'

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 00:02:23 GMT

I didn't do much this past spring break. Mostly, I cleaned house. But I decided it was also the perfect time to go fishing. So I got my old tackle box out of the storage room... and the fishing poles... went to walmart and bought some bait and headed on down to the lake. I'm definatly not a professional fisherman, in fact, I'm far from it. The 3 days I went fishing... believe it or not... I did not catch one thing. I saw fish all over the place. I did get a few bites. But I didn't catch not a thing. I need some good fishing advice because obviously I have no idea what I'm doing. But other than that... I did have fun... and I always do, even though I've never caught anything.

Spring Break

Sun, 11 Mar 2007 01:14:59 GMT

I'm finally on spring break. Half-way through my first semester of paramedic school. Things are going pretty good so far. I went part-time at work. The times I've worked since Jan. haven't yielded any interesting calls so far. I'm about to start working for another ambulance service soon. I'll be at it again, working hard. So far in school we've learned about the basics, patient assesment, and airway management. We're starting pharmacology after spring break, and then we're gonna do our hospital clinical rotations, or most of them. This past week we were learning how to do IVs... I had an accident and got stuck with a used needle. So I've spent the past week getting shots, and tests done, just as a precaution. Luckily this happened at school with someone I know, and not at work with someone I have no idea about. I was excited to see I was apparently featured on MSN spaces again. I think that's cool. I'm going to start posting regularly on here... because I realize I don't remember most of my calls now as well as I use to when it was all new and fresh. I'd like to have at least some record of what I've done, mainly to help me do better in the future, but also to share stories with people who are interested in reading them, and have an interest in this field, and especially those who are considering joining the biggest, and bestest family in the world... the awesome team...... EMS.

Our Ambulance is Getting a New Engine!

Sat, 16 Dec 2006 04:31:59 GMT

That's oil... that leaked from the radiator area... I think... and threw up all over the engine... We had brought this elderly woman in earlier in the day ... her neighbors found her laying in her own feces, urine, and blood on a couch... nobody had seen her for 4 days, and I'm guessing she had been on the couch for 4 days. Anyway, we took her to the local hospital which then decided to transfer her out with blood infused for a major GI bleed. So we were doing the emergency transfer, lights and sirens, then here comes the smoke covering the front windshield... I shut 'er down, and called for the other unit to come take the call... we waited for the tow truck to bring a backup... safe to say ours will be in the shop for quite a while. And yes, I checked the oil... or at least that's what's written on the check off sheet for the day *winks*

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Mon, 11 Dec 2006 20:00:12 GMT

Is it? I do love this time of year. The weather, the holidays, and most importantly the food. But, as far as work goes and the EMS field... it's not the most wonderful, it's the most deadly. This year anyways. The past I don't know how many shifts we have picked up at least one dead person. The last shift I worked wasn't any different. The call volume does seem to be slowing down for the Christmas holidays as it did last year. Last shift we only ran 2 calls. One was a nursing home call. A woman started going in to dementia and screaming... with no past history of it. That was nothing more than a simple load 'em up and take 'em next door to the hospital. That was at 11:30am. We didn't have our next call until 7:30pm. There was a student there on the other truck and she only had to get one more emergency call and she could go home. Go figure the only day that we don't do nothing all day is the day she needs just one call to go home. She went home at around 10pm that night I think. We both got toned out at 7:30pm for different calls. We took a call that was 20 miles out in the county near the Lousiana border. The other truck took a call in town. Our call was for an unknown man down parked in the middle of the road. When we got there he was doa. It looked like he might of had a heart attack or something and just slumped over. His foot was still on the break, headlights still on, but his truck had stalled out. Luckily for our amusement a little puppy showed up on scene and we played with it for the hour and a half it took for the coroner to show up. The coroner then took it home with her. After that we didn't have any more calls for the rest of the night.

Happy Holidays!

Sun, 03 Dec 2006 02:22:46 GMT

Happy Holidays everyone! I know it's been a while since I've published a new blog. I just lost interest in it for some reason. And I've also been busy with other things. I hope everyone is doing well and enjoying the holiday season so far. Let's see what have I been up to lately... work as usual. I recently went on vacation so I enjoyed that a lot. I went to Cleveland, OH. The past 2 months at work have been horrible. Excluding the last shift, we've been running our butts off. Almost every shift we have at least 1 death. Last shift we had an 82 year old woman pass away at her home. She had called her friend and asked her to come over. The friend said that was highly unusual for her, so sensing something was wrong she rushed over. To find the woman having severe chest pains. Before they had a chance to load her up in a car and take her to the hospital the friend said she collapsed and died. She then called another friend over. And called 911 40 minutes later. By that time there wasn't anything we could do. So we pronounced her dead. The shift before that we had a death at the correctional facility. That death is under investigation and we might have to go to court over it, or so I am told. I haven't heard what all went on with it, I think they're keeping it secret because of the investigation. But we got called to chest pain early in the morning at around 7am. When we pulled up a guard came outside and told me that the patient was down and they were doing CPR on her. So we worked her, took her to the hospital where they pronounced her dead. All that I was told by the guard was she had a respiratory infection and was suppose to see the doctor later that day. She got really sick at around 3am and "looked like she wasn't going to last much longer" according to the guard. But the nurse wouldn't call for an ambulance since she had an appointment later on that day. She was only 37 years old. Other than that... we've had a change from the normal "BS" calls ... to actually having "good" calls. And boy have we had a lot of those. Every shift non-stop it's someone near death, heart attacks, strokes, chf, drug overdoses... I'm going to get started working on this blog again. I'm currently in the process of getting registered to start paramedic school in Jan. After I start I will be going part time at work. Since there isn't really away I can go to school 8 hours 3 days a week and work a 24/48 shift pattern. I have an appointment with the college on Tuesday about that... so I'll know more about all of that then.

Visiting Family

Thu, 13 Jul 2006 02:39:21 GMT

Yesterday the first call we got in the morning was for a stroke, and dispatched called us up on our cell phone and said the person having the stroke was our supervisor's step dad. We went to the scene and this wasn't the normal mild stroke that has some symptoms but not all.. and leaves you guessing... this guy had it all... so we rushed him to the hospital, where our supervisor stayed with him for the rest of the day... he told us this was the second time this happened in a week. After that we got called to post and cover for another county and of course we got a call there while we were still 30 minutes away. We got to the scene and it was an eldery man just feeling bad. He wanted to go to the hospital 80 miles away instead of the one 2 miles away so we took him. It was kind of funny though... he had his paycheck in his pocket and his neighbor asked him if he wanted him to keep it for him... the old man dog cussed the guy out... apparently he's had his money stolen before... which is sad, but common. After that we got back... and had a call at the nursing home for "heart problems". When we got there of course it was shift change, and the woman was fine. We took her in the hospital... then not to long after had to take her right back to the nursing home. But something interesting happened while we were there. The 2 women who were working started flirting with us... and one grabbed both me and my partner's behinds. Full moon... huh... we promised we wouldn't file sexual harassment charges... I didn't really have a problem with it... it was funny to me. After that we came back to the station and slept until 5:45am when we got another call for breathing difficulties... we were canceled off of that before we ever left the parking lot. Last shift was a good enjoyable shift and I actually got to sleep some... I'm looking forward to more like this.

Midnight Special: Transfers

Tue, 11 Jul 2006 00:16:21 GMT

Last shift wasn't to bad, at least not at first. We came in, checked the truck off, and went and had breakfast. It was about 8:30am, just as we were finishing breakfast, when we had our first call. It was the local rehab nursing home for a patient with breathing difficulties. We arrive and the nursing staff advises us that the man's Oxygen saturation dropped down to 50% which isn't to good... but they gave him a breathing treatment (he had a history of asthma) and it went back up to 98%. He was still having trouble breathing so we loaded him up in the ambulance, sat him up... something the nursing home never seems to think about doing... turned the air conditioning on and gave him another breathing treatment. By the time we made the 5 minute trip to the hospital he said he felt good as new... even healthier than he usually does. The next call was an older woman with sickle cell. She was in pain so we didn't hesitate to take her 30 miles away to the closest hospital that would be able to handle her condition. After that call we were sent to post in another city for coverage while their one ambulance did an out of town transfer. On the way there we got a call for a wreck, non emergency, so we figured by the time we got there the patients would either have left, or didn't need medical treatment. We were wrong. It was 2 kids complaining of the exact same injuries, who were in big trouble for taking their grandmother's car joyriding and having a wreck in it. I think the older one might of actually had some arm pain but the youngest said nothing was wrong until we got her in the ambulance with the older and she listened to her sister's problems. Then she changed her story. I'm sure they were more worried about the spanking they were gonna get when they got home than anything else. If I was in that situation I'd probably play the injured card to avoid a good spanking as well. We had to take them to a hospital 25 minutes away per request of the grandmother, to the city where they lived. So, we got done with that and headed back to our station. We got back in at around 9pm and thought... well hoped we would at least be able to sleep some at night. I went to sleep at around 11:30pm after I got done doing everything I had to do... and at 1am the alarm went off and we had a transfer to a hospital almost 100 miles away. When everything was said and done we got back to the station at 5:45am... and we get off at 6:30am... so needless to say we were exhausted... I still am... it's rough doing those late night transfers when we haven't slept at all during the day.

Good Morning

Sat, 08 Jul 2006 09:21:00 GMT

I woke up early this morning and thought to myself, "I haven't posted on my blog in a while now." So I decided to give a brief update on what's been going on in the life of a very busy EMT lately. First off, I'm up early because of a sore throat... the cold stuff is going around I guess I'm finally catching it... also I have to go to work this morning and stay there for a long 24 hours as well. The past several weeks have really been a blur. We've been extremely busy at work, most shifts we've ran at least 12 calls, one shift we hit 21 different calls. It's been the same old stuff for the most part... not to many exciting calls on I've been to just relentless calls of the same old stuff. There was been some interesting calls in my area though... double amputation of the arms, interesting calls that I am excited to go on... even though of course I feel sorry for the people in the situation, it's interesting to me from a medical point of view. I went on a 8 day vacation from work it caused a big dip in my pay since I'm just short of my one year vacation pay days... but that's getting close to. Hard to believe I've been doing this for just short of a year now. I haven't started paramedic school yet. The schools here were shut down because of hurricane katrina. I'm hoping to start in Jan. when the next available class opens... hopefully another hurricane won't ruin those plans. My vacation was wonderful. It did me good to get away from work for 8 days, especially since we've been so busy the past couple of months. I drove 18 hours to Cleveland, OH and stayed there for 5 days. I enjoyed every bit of it, including the drive. Being from the south... the north wasn't what I expected it to be. It wasn't much different from Mississippi. I haven't been out of the state that much, obviously, so I guess you could see why that would surprise me so much. The people where I stayed where very nice and friendly which also surprised me... I've never heard of northern hospitality before. Sure it's more populated... but that's about the only difference. It's time for me to get ready for work so I better get going... I've neglected this blog, and I plan on doing a better job of sharing my stories in the future... besides it just makes me feel better getting things off of my chest and out of my head.

Shot Dead Can't Breath

Tue, 30 May 2006 01:32:11 GMT

This Sunday I agreed to work for another guy at a different station. He's a nice guy so I figured I'd help him out... I know I'll need someone to work for me sooner or later. He was going to play music at church, so I was just going to stay until 3pm. He told me I could go over there, lay down, and go to sleep for a while... of course as soon as he said that I knew it wasn't going to be the case, but I didn't mind at all. It's safe to say I didn't get any rest... I clocked out that morning at about 6:30am... at my regular station and headed for the 25 min drive to the other one in a neighborhing county. When I was driving in to town of the other station I got paged on my pager for a call.. I thought they just had me in the system for the other station, but nope that was for there... so as soon as I drove up I was in the ambulance on my way to a shooting/unconsious call. On the way there dispatch asked us to call so I did... he said a woman said someone shot her baby and the scene was not secured yet. It was about 12 miles away so by the time we got close the scene had been secured... we drove up to find an older male shot to death. Someone had shot him 1 or 2 times in the chest... and shot him in the side of the head... with an exit wound out the other side... some brains in his hair and some on the carpet... luckily it was a small caliber gunshot wound... he was cold and dead so we didn't do any kind of treatment or anything else... just simply waited around a few hours for investigators and corner to get there... where I was working, unlike the regular place, they have someone else transport bodies, so we didn't have to do that either. All the family and neighbors believed it was the girlfriend who did it... and the woman who found him said she saw the girlfriend pass us on our way there. It's kind of crazy to think a woman would do that... but I believe it... a few shifts ago we had a woman who was walking down the street with her 1 year old baby, another woman almost ran them over... and some words were exchanged, so the woman driving the car got a box cutter out and sliced her down the face and stabbed her in the adbomen... and this was in this area... we were just covering... people are crazy... anyways the guy that had been shot was 20 years old... my age.. kinda sad... everyone said he was well liked and didn't have any problems with anyone... except his girlfriend who he argued with constantly. After that call we went back to the station... and I fell asleep... of course as soon as I did... the toner went off and we had another wild call. This time it was right across the street from the station luckily... this guy was squirting blood out of this trach tube like it was a water hose... everytime he coughed blood exploded out... he had just got the trach put in because he had a large mass in his throat... cancer... so we took him to the hospital where they stabalized him and flew him to Jackson for surgery. He kept saying he couldnt' breath... and I know that has to be one of the most uncomfortable feelings in the world to have something like that happen... drowning in your own blood...

YOU WENT TO EAT 2 TIMES???!!!

Sun, 14 May 2006 22:41:21 GMT

Well... we finally had it out with each other last shift. Tension had been rising... the other crew had been smarting off to us... and having a bad attitude towards us for a while now... and since it's just us and them working at the station now it was starting to create an atomosphere that was making it stressful to come to work and deal with every shift. Both me and my partner are not from the city we work in, but everyone else that works there is. So we don't know everyone as well and aren't as good friends... since me and him have both only been working there for about 8 months now, versus the years everyone else has... so we're both new trying to get along. Well, we talked to the crew we were relieving the shift before last about the problems we were having with the crew we worked with. They agreed that we weren't the only ones that had the problem, that basically everyone at the station felt the same way. So the guy we talked to about it went and told them that they're making our lives at work miserable and they need to lay off before they run us off. The one guy from our shift said "Good... I'm glad that bug I put in their ear is working(talking about telling my partner there was an opening elsewhere)" he went and told his partner that we were saying they're dodging calls and etc... and his partner said "It wouldn't hurt my feelings none if they were gone." So after that... later on that day I noticed the guy that's stirring all this trouble around is in the supervisor's office... which leads me up to last shift. We walk in to relieve the crew and I'm told that that guy had been in the supervisor's office claiming we were dodging calls, "hiding behind mcdonalds" "going to eat 2 times at the same restaurant in one shift" when we went on out of town transfers... staying at the hospital to long ... and so on and so forth... so the supervisor laughs in his face and said we've done nothing wrong... and in fact he heard that they were the ones dodging calls. So EVERY other crew working in the station goes in and tells the supervisor that we do a good job, takes up for us, and tells them everything they know of, that that crew has done. So a few mins later they come on shift... and we start having a "heart to heart" which includes yelling and cussing (not done by me or the other basic, but by the paramedics) about everything that was told to the supervisor. The other paramedic accused us of dodging calls, screwing around, and causing problems with the system. We quickly pointed out that we've done nothing wrong... and we'll continue doing what we're doing... We hadn't ever dodged a call, infact we had helped the other crew out more than once in taking their calls late at nights when they were tired, or at other times. So it was completely ridiculous that this childish thing had to happen. It caused a lot of problems. The other crew both apologized to us... but there's still that tension there... that you can't trust them anymore after what they said and done to us... and I don't think it'll be the same for a while. I just can't get over the fact that they said something as stupid to a supervisor as "They go and eat to times at the same place" We do go to eat at this same place when we do an out of town transfer, but we call in our order leaving the hospital, swing by and pick it up, my partner eats in the ambulance, and I eat it when we get back to the station... how does that put a strain on the system? The funny thing is... everything they said we do...they're the ones that actually do it, and the supervisor was made aware of that once they tried to rat us out, by every other crew that works there. So the supervisor said we're in the clear, and he's going to go down hard on the other guys if they keep this up. I'm an easy going person and I try to get along with everyone... but I don't appreciate what they tried to do to us... and I don't like working in a bad atmosphere when things are stressful enough from losing a truck. I enjoy my job and I enjoy running calls... but it's so irritating working with a crew that doesn't and is always jumping on Posting assignments to avoid calls, and worrying about who is up next.

Give Me My Drugs!...

Mon, 08 May 2006 01:47:10 GMT

What's the DEAL with people using so much drugs these days? I'm not talking about the ones who use it legally either. For the past SEVERAL shifts it never fails. We get a call at 2, 3am in the morning and go out... to someone who is either faking a seizure.... trying to get some valium... or someone who is having "pain" that can't be helped by normal OTC stuff. And usually when they have "pain" they've also been taking pain medications... and when we ask if they have a prescription... no they don't... they're using their family's... friends... etc... and they're asking us to take them to the hospital to get a prescription for the pain medication. This one woman we had last night... had the nerve to try to get us to take her to a different hospital, 30 miles out of the way... because she knew the doctor in the ER wouldn't prescribe her pain medications. The drug problem where I work is amazing... for such a small city. I'm just wondering is this problem happening everywhere, or is it just in a localized area? It's sad. That's one thing I have very little compassion for is people who abuse drugs... or alchohol. I can understand they need help to get off the drugs, but if they don't want to help themsevles there ain't nobody else going to be able to help them either. They just end up hurting their familes, friends, and either killing themselves or ruining their life for good. I've dealt with people like that in my personal life... more the reason I have very little sympathy for someone who is abusing something and doesn't want help... if they want help... then I'm all for them.

Budget Cuts And Staffing Problems...

Sat, 06 May 2006 04:26:41 GMT

This past week they've cut our 12 hour ambulance out completely to move the 12 hour crews over to open shifts on a 24 hour truck. It makes sense to do that but in turn means that we are running 2 times as many calls as we use to. The past few shifts I have not gotten any rest at all... when at least when we have the 12 hour truck we got a little during the day. The place where I work has a high call volume and only having 2 trucks, is stressing the system. People are already calling in sick, and taking off... I'm doing my best to work and stay healthy. Last shift was a weird one... of course since I started working 24s... I really haven't had a boring shift. First thing in the morning we had a death. It was a 46 year old man. He had died in his sleep. The family told us that he was a "crack head" and the night before he died, he was sitting up in the living room watching tv, and he kept going in to a daze and finally said he was going to bed. The police came in and worked a crime scene. There was blood coming out of his mouth... not sure exactly what that was from... we took him to the morgue and they're going to do an autopsy so I'm sure through word of mouth I'll hear the news from that as well in the next few weeks. After that it wasn't to bad. We had a wreck. It was just a fender bender. But a poor 11 year old girl she was having back pain so of course we had to immobilize her... and imagine that, just 10 minutes earlier she was in the ER for a nose bleed... and to top it off it was her birthday the next day. So we took her to the hospital, I'm sure they checked her out and let her go not to long after we brought her in. After that... the other truck had gotten a call for a wreck... and about 45 minutes later we got a call at the jail. The guy at the jail had caused the wreck because he had taken to muscle relaxers and he was arrested for DUI. So we went and picked him up... oh how pleasant... when we started waking up he started cussing us out and screaming like a child when we tried starting i.v.'s. He had gone unconscious shortly after the first ambulance left the wreck (he refused transport that time). So the police handcuffed his arm down to the stretcher and I held the other one while my partner started an I.V. and we took him to the hospital making sure the husband of the woman who was hurt in the wreck didn't see him... apparently he was extremely mad... it's ironic the guy who caused the wreck didn't get hurt by the actual wreck... but the other people did... that's how it usually is though, huh? Anyways... it was quiet after that... until about 4am... we got called out for a cardiac arrest... it was a 79 year old man... who had a history of heart problems... he was gone when we got there. So we pronounced him and waited an hour and a half for the corner to get there... they had another dead at a nursing home...to at the same time. That's pretty much how every shift's been for a while. We have some interesting calls every shift... which is great for me. I enjoy getting a break from transfers and nursing home runs... and having some good stuff.

Guys... Women Aren't Worth It!

Sat, 29 Apr 2006 23:19:13 GMT

Ok... I got your attention I bet. The guys who see this are probably shaking their head "Yeah" before they even read this post... and the women are ready to bite my face off. Well, this blog isn't really about women... but about a guy that I went on a call to recently who was having some trouble with a woman who he was apparently in love with... or more so crazy over. They're relationship had just ended... after about 4 years and it was wasn't a good ending either. They didn't just say their good byes and move on... my guy... he couldn't just say good bye. He wanted to be with just her. So he kept calling her all the time... following her around... trying to talk to her... begging her to come back to him... but she wouldn't. She didn't want him anymore... actually she was with a new man. Oh, my guy didn't like this at all! He started stalking her. Following the girl and the guy around. He even tried to run them off the road one night... while they were driving back home... I guess he figured he could put that .22 loaded with only 2 rounds to some good use... but fortunatly he didn't get the chance. The ex-girlfriend finally told the police and he was taken in and told not to go around her anymore... and amazingly enough he stopped bothering her all together. Instead, he sat in his house by himself for weeks, writing journal entries about how crazy he felt and how he hoped God would forgive him for what he was going to do. Well, that leads up to when we were called in. "gunshot wound to the head self inflicted"... we were dispatched to. We got there... he was laying in the bed with a bullet hole through his head and the rifle near by... blood spattered all over the room... brains and blood in the bed... and he was still alive. All the bullet did was bounce around inside his head, scrambling his brains and giving him a chance at living the rest of his live as a vegetable. We got him tubed and iv started and did as much for him as we could do... he was covered in blood... and there was cuts all over his arm... apparently... first he tried taking 30 muscle relaxers... when that didn't work... he headed to the bathroom and got a razor blade and started cutting his arms.... and that didn't work so he went to the bedroom, laid down, held a .22 rifle up to his head and pulled the trigger... well that didn't do the job either... at least not right away... we air lifted him to the trauma hospital where he died the next day. His parents called our station that same day asking if we saw his gold chain they had got him for Christmas... they said he always had it on him... ironically he wasn't wearing it the day he ended it all. They were in shock... A 36 year old man ended it all over a woman. Guys... it's not worth it. Same for you ladies, no man is worth your life.. The reason I say this is I want to make sure everyone who reads this understands... for some reason the poor fool we had didn't know this.

That time of year?

Sat, 25 Mar 2006 00:22:00 GMT

For some reason the past several shifts we've had dead people. Most of them under 40 years old. Is it just that time of year or what? I hardly ever had to work a cardiac arrest since I've started working and now the past few shifts we're getting slammed with them every day. Last shift we didn't though. We were talking about how lucky we were... until we went to the hospital at about 3 in the morning and found out someone we brought in the shift before also died... we're going to have to put a bumper sticker on the back of our ambulance "The Grim Reapers" if this keeps up... We do still have the stress relief of such comical calls as the woman who had a bug stuck in her ear. She called the hospital while we were still there and my partner answered the phone since everyone was busy. She was yelling saying there was a bug stuck in her ear and it was still buzzing around. So, my partner told her to call 911 and we'd go out and see if we couldn't get it out. We go out to her house and she's standing outside with her hands covering her ears. We take her in and I use my penlight to look in her ear... sure enough, there's something deep inside moving around. With me standing there providing light, my partner gets the critter out... it's a small moth... still alive. She's so happy we got it out... she thanks us several times... let's us play with her dogs... gives us a bag full of stuffed animals for kids... we take the moth back to the hospital with us... to show the doctor working there... I don't think she like the fact we left it on her desk with a note... we released the moth unharmed. I felt great knowing that I saved a insect from a tragic and premature death inside the ear canal of an elderly woman. Other then the relentless cardiac arrests... not much is happening... we're just sittin around the station watching tv, eating, and hanging out. I'm gaining to much weight now though... I'm going on a diet and excersize program starting tomorrow... hopefully I'll be able to stick to it... well not tomorrow I'll be at work, but when I get home!

Jump Start Suicide

Tue, 07 Mar 2006 20:30:16 GMT

I'm at work right now. It's only 2:24 and it feels like midnight. It's been a busy day for our area. First off, and I mean as soon as we walked in the door and start our shift, we get a suicide. So we go on our way (6:30am) to where dispatch told us to go... we were going to standby and wait for police to secure the scene when dispatch called us back and told us they cut the body down (it was a hanging) and put it in the car and was going to meet us. So we go to the meeting place and look inside the car. This guy is tossed in the back seat of an SUV, cold, rigid, obviously dead, and obviously nothing we could do, for him, a 45 year old drug addict. The brother and brother in law was driving the SUV and they had some odd behavior. I'm not sure if it is because they were in shock or something else. The whole story seems a little bit weird to me. First off they said that he hung himself with jumper cables that you use to jump start your battery. The police went on to the scene and found a bucket, jumper cable, and a bottle of beer. They couldn't think of a reason as to why he would kill himself, besides the fact that he had an ongoing affair with a woman and he was married. We took the body to the morgue after the coroner came out and examined the body more closely to find that there were imbedded marks in the guys face from where the cables had caught him in the upper face/jaw. It didn't hit his neck exactly but it still squeezed his blood shut and obstructed his air flow. They still haven't ruled it a suicide of homicide yet.

Coming off of that we get called to a seizure. It's way out in the woods somewhere. We get there the vol. first responders are there, and the woman's daughter. My partner goes in and I get the stretcher ready... he's wanting suction the daughter's yelling suction so of course our portable suction fails. We get her in the ambulance only to find nothing to suction out even though there's some gurgling noises coming out. So, obviously the woman is having a seizure... my partner gives her some valium and it starts working on her and getting things calmed down, not good enough... we run lights and sirens 17 miles to the closet hospita. Come to find out a guy we had brought in a few shifts ago died. He had came in the doctor for a broken wrist... passed out and fell at the office, went back to the hospital later that night, got released, passed out again and broke his hip, had a full scan done to find a mass on his brain stem, his stats start dropping, we take him to a better hospital and he died yesterday. After we got done with call we had to wait around for a few minutes. Everyone was tied up running calls and we were waiting to get our regular truck back (It was in the shop for routine maintenence). So we go and get that taken care of. We stop by this sub shop ... they have the best sub's I've ever tasted though... kind of expensive, $9.00 for the large meal, not to bad, better than subway just costs a little more. There's a joke going around the station... well I won't go in to graphic detail but for any of you that have seen "Waiting" one of the guys here was exposed to the "Bat Wing". He hasn't been the same ever since. He's a lot sweeter now and nicer... more talkative... we're starting to wonder about him... he's developed prostrate problems from it... well if you've seen the movie you'd understand more about what's going on with that. It's 10pm now and I"m going to try to get some rest... hopefully they'll leave us alone tonight I haven't got much rest today since we've been steady with runs all day long.

24 Hour Shifts

Sun, 05 Mar 2006 04:56:27 GMT

I'm laying in my bed at the station. I finally got switched over to the 24 hour shift. Law & Order's playin on the TV and I'm surfing the net. It's definatly more laid back and enjoyable working this shift than it was working the 12 hour shift. I have more time to do what I want outside of work now. And considering the fact that 12 hour shifts are about to go to 7 days on, 7 days off I'm very glad I decided to make the change. I haven't had a lot of experience with the night crowd around here but I think the FREAKS come out after dark! I've had some pretty weird calls here lately since I've been running at night. One call, a woman ripped her boyfriends scrotum open while they were "playing around" she said she "pulled to hard" but it looked like she had taken a knife to him or something sharp...ouch... I had nightmares about that for days. Another call, more recently, we got dispatched to this psychiatric call. So we go... and of course there's no sheriff units avaiable to cover us and make sure the scene is secure, so we make sure it's secure on our own. I call dispatch and find out that it's a husband that's called 911 because her wife, a mother of 2 small children, also a chronic drug abuser bipolar psychopath is having another "episode" so we walk in their house and she is walking around naked smoking a cigarette with her little kid following her around, right behind her, crying. I felt sorry for the kid having to see his mom like that. We started to move to the strether and she became combative, so of course, having no sheriff backup we had to handle it ourselves, with the husband's help. We got her on the stretcher, restrained her, and of course after all that was said and done 3 sheriff deputies showed up just as we were leaving the residence. On the way there she went from violent to nasty. She started offereing sexual favors to my partner and my partner tried to redirect them to me... jokingly. It was some wild stuff. All in all I'm really enjoying the 24 it's a lot of fun.

A Bad Week Off...

Sat, 11 Feb 2006 21:24:14 GMT

I was planning to go on a trip to Ohio this week. But since the winter storms are coming in... I'm going to have to cancel those plans. It's even suppose to possibly snow here! It hasn't snowed here in several years now... last time it snowed and stuck was when I was about 10 years old I think... so it's been a while. I love cold weather, and snow... I know that sounds funny coming from somewhere who rarely ever experiences it. Since the weather's suppose to be bad... I guess I'll just hang around the house this week... I have some valentine's day plans with my sweetheart. I work 3 more days on a 12 hour truck then the next monday, the 20th, I'm switching over to a 24 hour shift. It'll make it a lot easier for me to get through these classes I have to take for paramedic school. I liked working the 12 hour shift... but it was just obvious that wasn't the best thing for me to do. I have to drive an hour to work every morning, and an hour back home at night... I get up early, get in late... and don't have much time to do anything else. It also uses up a lot of gas considering I have a F150 that burns it up fast. Hopefully, when I switch over to a 24 hour shift it won't be as stressful. Oh lord, my mom has not smoked since last Friday, when she had her heart attack. It's about to drive all of us crazy... she's been in a bad mood... but she's gradually coming out of it now... and my dad's trying anything and everything he can to figure out ways to make her happy and forget about her cigarette cravings she has every 5 minutes. She's been eating a lot of hard candy... I think that's what's she's using to stop her cravings... she can't use those patches or the gum or anything like that. So it's been an interesting week... with that. I'm happy it turned out there wasn't anymore damage or blockage... I was really worried there for a few days. I took my first test in my A&P class... a class that I've been scared of... somewhat. I did good... got a high C, almost a B. I'll do better next time, now that I'm used to this online class. I tried taking A&P last summer... and with everything else I had going on... I got overwhelmed and ended up dropping out... and since it's an absolute requirement for paramedic classes... I was a little worried about trying it again. The main problem I have taking A&P is not the biology... but the chemistry aspect.. I just can not get it... no matter what I try to do to understand it... for some reason chemistry is just a complete mystery to me. I'm planning to start the actual paramedic classes in August... so I'll be a paramedic hopefully around this time next year. *Crosses Fingers*. Thanks to everyone who posted all those thoughtful comments about my mom, I appreciate them.

Last week we had the usual calls... chest pains...the flu... general stuff like that. But one call we went on stands out... by far. It was about 5pm in the afternoon and we got toned out. When we went en route dispatch advised it was a behavioral/suicide attempt secondary to burns... so I thought this was going to be an interesting call... they also asked us to give them a call. My partner called them while we were on the way there and come to find out... the guy's wife called in and said that he had taken all the hot ashes from the fire place and thrown it on himself... and he wouldn't let anybody touch him. Ok.. this definatly was going to be interesting. We drove on to the main road the call was off of, and waited for the sheriff office to come and take the lead. We followed the sherriff deputy to the residence, got out walked in... the first thing we noticed when we walked in was all the lights were off in the house. There was ashes all over the floor leading from a burnt pile of clothes and a burnt couch all the way to the back bedroom. In the bedroom, the man was sitting there, not able to talk but still responsive... his clothes he had on weren't burnt, and the bed he was on wasn't burnt. The only thing we noticed at that time was that his hands were burnt extremely bad. So we loaded him on the stretcher and took him out to the ambulance. When we got him to the ambulance my partner noticed a burn to the back of his neck... so he took his clothes off... his arms were completely burnt up so we rushed him to the hospital. When we got him in the hospital. We examined him closer... and found that his entire back was also burnt up... second and third degree burns in some places. This was a mystery to us... nobody could seem to figure out what had happened to him... his wife had left early that morning and came back and found him in the bed, dressed, and the doctor said the burns looked several hours old. He had a history of violent seizures so the only thing anybody could come up with that made sense is that he had fallen in to the fire place, caught his clothes on fire, changed, and went and laid in bed. It was just a bizarre call and everything didn't fit together quite right. They flew him to Baton Rouge, to a burn center that night. I haven't heard anything else about it. Let's pray he makes it.

Photo Album: Antique Ambulances

Fri, 28 Apr 2006 21:09:52 GMT

Antique Ambulances

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Ant1

Ant2

Ant3

Ant5

Ant7

Photo Album: Rescue Helicopters

Mon, 06 Feb 2006 17:22:36 GMT

Rescue Helicopters

Chopter1

Chopter2

Chopter5

Chopter6

Photo Album: Ambulances

Fri, 16 Sep 2005 01:52:58 GMT

Ambulances

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Ford_E350_ambulance2

HANOVER%20AMBULANCE

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northfield%20ambulance

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Wed, 13 Dec 2006 03:01:28 GMT

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Wed, 15 Feb 2006 06:13:03 GMT

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