Category: health

Smackdown

Wow! So many of you rushed to my defense. I’m honored and greatly appreciate the support. I wasn’t really offended by the few negative comments. I just gathered from the varied responses maybe I needed to clarify a bit. I’m by no means discouraged from blogging. Puh-lease! You can’t get rid of me that easy. hehehe.

I will add the one negative email was followed up w/another rather sarcastic one that I had an obligation to explain myself the first time. Well, that might be true but if you read more often Mr. ANON you might not have jumped to the wrong conclusion so hastily. And, I might add, making such quick judgements from one post on a blog of person you’ve never met doesn’t really show much for your intelligence. It sorta gives the impression of just the opposite. But, hey what do I know right?

Anyway, moving on. I got a call from one of my classmates from EMT class this morning. He is working for one of the privates. We talked about different cases, happenings, etc. When he told me how much he makes, my jaw hit the floor. A fraction of what I’m making now. Absolutely no way in hell I could quit my current gig to work as a private EMT full time. They get paid squat. Thankfully, he is doing other stuff to help pay the bills. What does this mean for me? Just that I have to stay on my current course.

It was so much fun talking shop w/someone at my level of experience. He works mostly BLS (basic life support) calls so he doesn’t see much heavy stuff. But as emergencies are never predictible, he’s had some good calls. He was amazed to hear about my last call. Overall, I’m still very much the novice but I learn quick. It’s not so much the actual work I’m doing while riding along but the exposure and understanding it imparts. Sadly, the city has put hiring for EMT positions on hold so I’m having to switch gears a bit. I’ll keep doing ride alongs until I get enough hours to go back to school. The current goal is to start classes in the spring semester.

Life or Death

Ok, so after a flurry of emails/comments regarding my last post, I feel the need to clarify.

No, I am not happy people die or get sick. Nor do I take joy in it. Howver, people die every day. In my line of work, I’m bound to see it and often. If you thought that I was rejoicing in someone else’s loss for even a moment, I suggest you read here more often. I do however, take joy in learning a new job skill. Especially one that I enjoy. My enthusiasm is borne from a desire to help those around me. Duh!

One particular email compared me to Satan which I find HIGH-larious. First of all, if the mythical hell really did exist, I’m sure the gays would move in, fix it up, make it hip and then all the straights would want it again. As if.

For the rest of you, yes he lived. I rarely know the outcome of my patients however, I happened to know one of the interns so she emailed me. It was a clot, as suspected, and it was successfully removed. The patient has already moved to standard care bed and will be out of the hospital soon.

Remember the tweaker chick I told you about? Apparently, she got one fix too many. She ran out in front of a muni bus. Witnesses in the area said she was yelling that gaint bees where chasing her. She is no longer w/us. Still think meth is fun?

C3 & C3

Code 3 and Code 3 (again)

OMG! I had a fantastic ride along today on the ambulance. Even better than this one. The day started off pretty slow. About midway thru it, we get a standard call w/a complaint of chest pain. We go 97 (onscene) to discover a 49yom w/a classic case of MI (heart attack). He responds well to treatment enroute to the hospital and we arrive, make the transfer w/no difficulty. As we turn to leave, the guy literally goes into full arrest on the ER bed. It was awesome! We got to help the ER crew work him up not once, twice, three times. OMG! What a learning experience. It is very very VERY rare for first responders to witness someone go into full arrest. Not to mention right in the hospital. We ususally see before and after scenarios.

But it gets even better. The hospital didn’t have a cath lab so we had to transfer him to another hospital. We stood around for about 20 minutes while the ER staff pumped him full of drugs and plugged all the extra machines in. With all the extra apparatus we had to have one of the ER nurses ride w/us to the 2nd hospital. At the 2nd hospital, I got to watch them prep the patient for surgery. The docs were cool and commented on what a great job we’d done.

It blew all my other calls away. So now, I’m back at the call center for my regular shift. Kind of anti-climatic but that’s the way it goes I guess.

How was your day?

Double Trouble

I worked a double yesterday. And let me just tell you, I was a tired nelly come the end of my day. Oy! Sixteen hours, 8 on the ambulance and 8 in the call center. It didn’t help that I only got 5 hours sleep the previous night. But I made it thru ok. Today, I’m back to my normal chipper self.

I had the oddest dream last night. I was racing on my motorcyle. NO, that isn’t the odd part. The odd part was I was naked. It seemed pefectly normal in the dream though. Odder still, I was racing and yet working on the engine at the same time. Somehow, I was able to be on the bike one sceond and then next to it working on it all at the same time. It gets better. I kept bumping my willy on the tailpipe somehow. I can’t really describe it as it doesn’t make sense now. I just remember thinking “why doesn’t it burn?” Weird huh?

I can’t help but think it was somehow related to my last patient yesterday. I’m on the ambulance and we arrive onscene at a gas station. Chica had locked herself in the bathroom, stripped all her clothes off and was tweaking out of her gourd. She kept seeing blood everywhere it wasn’t. She’d just had her fix and was freakin’ the fuck out. We finally get her dressed in the back of the ambulance. But once she discovered we didn’t have any meds for her, she promptly hopped out of the back and trodded off.

What kind of weird dream have you had lately?

Code 3 – v2.0

What I did for my fourth of July?

Well, I helped a nice Russian lady face the hard reality of pending organ failure due to chronic Hep C infection. She developed an upper GI bleed today and showed the first stages of organ failure. Sadly, her future doesn’t look rosey.

Then I worked a 49 year old male in full arrest from a MI (heart attack). He later coded (died) at the hospital. While the learning experience for me was invaluable, all I wanted to do was hug his poor wife afterwards. They were visiting from out of town. I’m sure this wasn’t in the vacation plans. I can only imagine what it’s like to lose a loved while on vacation in a foreign city. I can’t speak for other cities but, the emergency responder care you get in SF is first rate. We had 3 paramedics onscene, a paramedic captain, and 4 EMT’s (including me). With the exception of moi, it’s a standard response on any type of resuscitation. We “worked” the man for almost an hour before finally transporting C3 (code 3) to the nearest hospital. We didn’t think he’d live but since he had what’s called a ‘workable rhythm’ on his heart-rate, we did the best we could. I’m a quick study and that one call made it worth it for all my previous ride alongs. I’m very fortunate in that I assimilate info quickly. The other firefighters didn’t know I was a newbie till after it was over and my crew mentioned it.
Continue reading Code 3 – v2.0

Nonsense

I had another ride along today. It went well. Not very busy but something is better than nothing. I always find my ride alongs a lesson in humility. I usually end up dealing w/the down-trodden and cast aways of society. Whether by fault or fate, life dealt these folks a shitty hand. Some make the best of it, others wallow in their misery. Either way, I’m reminded of how lucky I am and how far we need to go as a society before we can even begin to throw around terms like “civilized”. It is unthinkable that we allow folks to sink to such lows.

While responding to a victim of an assualt, we happen to see a man walking the streets sort of erratically. The most striking trait is the odd color of his hands. By odd, they were completely purple. Not a good sign regardless of the reason. It becomes apparent said person isn’t dealing w/a full deck as we watch him perform a sort of hopscotch of hopping back and forth across the street. PD was onscene and mentioned he’d been 5150’d (psych eval’d) previously on several occasions. Uh, yeah! Here we have a man that w/medication and just a modicum of daily intervention could lead a normal even productive life. Thanks to a variety of issues, including our shitty no-good piece-of-shit president’s policy of robbing this country of any social programs, this poor soul is left homeless and forgotten. He wanders the streets on a daily basis in a cloud of chemical dysfuntion. And true to description, after dealing w/our current patient, we can’t find him. Lost once again in the daily shuffle of life. He is but one of many such people in this city. And not just SF, you could pick any large city in the US and encounter a similar problem.

Oh, and our assault victim? A victim true enough. But, as soon as PD left, he hopped out of the ambulance and was on his way. He was what we call a “repeat offender”. Someone who works the ins and outs of the system just so he can get a ‘free ride’. But how free is it when your life is at the whim of social services, housed in squalor, and totally dependent on the kindness of others?

At day’s end I find my faith in my current career choice renewed. I may not be able to save them all but I know I can make a difference. Even if that “difference” is a compassionate face in the chain of faces one must endure when faced w/a life on the streets.

Emergency?

Is it possible I’m FINALLY on another ride along today? Well, if it’s after 8:00am and this is still here, it’s true!

** Update **

Yes, it did happen. It’s been so long I was getting discouraged. This was a new medic too and I really liked them. They were knowledgable and treated every patient w/dignity. I really liked seeing that. There are ways w/dealing w/”repeat offenders” however, being ugly isn’t one of them. They found me energetic and eager to learn which made their job easier. YAY!

Long day though and I’m tired. Doing laundry now. It’s piled up so high I can’t avoid it any longer. I’m down at the local Sit & Spin doing it as I can do all the loads at once. I’ve resigned myself to just having it done. My free time is continually limited and I’m not keeping up w/it. (Yeah, I’m lazy too but that’s not the point.)

A Pox On Your House…

I had to go see my doc today. Last night, I developed a full body rash that was hella itchy. I normally would have waited before going to see the doc but, I have a ride-a-long on the ambulance tomorrow. I thought it prudent to get checked out. It hasn’t moved onto my face, for which, I am sooo grateful. Of course, the new EMT in me started checking off the possibilities…

Scabbies – No – been there did that once at 19. There is no mistaking it for something else.

Syphilis – No – this nasty little STD can often bring on symptoms from other little buggers hiding in your spine. Had a screening no less than two weeks ago and all good. It is possible to test negative during the primary stage so we took another blood test today just to make sure. Yes, I’m thankful my penis won’t be falling off anytime soon.

Chickenpox/Shingles – No, this would have been an irony as just last week I was reading Johnny’s run in w/said illness. Mind you, I am very leary of catching the pox. I missed it as a kid and it is much much worse if you get it as an adult. Again, thank the stars, I still have plenty of antibodies from my last vaccination.

What’s left? Allergic reaction. – Well that is the consensus I reached with my doc. Not having a clue what it might be, I’m hoping it clears up before my guests arrive later in the week. I’d hate to be remembered as the buggy blogger.

Busy Bee III

No rest for the wicked. I’m off but not such luck on actually being free. *sigh* I miss having a life. (Wait, did I ever have one?…*pondering*)

I’m off to work to bend fresh minds to my iron will. The current class has finished their first rotation and today is their one day classroom training session before starting 2nd rotation. Out of 18 there are 9 left. Sadly, that’s better than most. The remaining group is doing well though.

Tomorrow, I’m headed over to City College to help my previous instructor w/his new EMT class. They are coming toward the end of the semester and doing much more hands on.

Wednesday, I have to go in early (7:00am) as I’m learning the new dynamic deployment for fire side. (I’m not exactly a morning person so I’m sure I’ll be extra cranky that day.) We are switching to a new type of dispatching for medics in the city. Instead of placing them at fire stations they will be roaming. We will use an AVL (automatically verifiy location) system to deploy medics for emergency calls. Basically, it just means we’ll have more tools to do our job effectively. Not any new skills but more attention is required now. The current system is sloppy at best. After a week of training, I hit the floor. One of the perks might be better days off for awhile. I might end up w/a weekend day or two off thru the month of April.

Stick & Stones Will . . .

I thought I’d talk about something other than myself today. Yeah, I know, there’s a first.

I do keep up my blogroll even though I get behind at times. Some more than others but I usually make it to all about once a week. Lately though, I’ve been reading Steve from Bent Collective a lot. If you aren’t a heavy reader of Bent, you should be. Here you have a man in the prime of his life giving of himself to help others. He traveled half way around the world to the bodunk country of Uzbekistan, easily a third world country, to setup a clinic and care for the ravaged HIV population there. Uzbekistan is only 2 small countries away from Afghanistan. They don’t particularly like us. Of course, being so far away does present some technological issues. Enter his friend Al who often keeps us apprised of Steve’s lastest efforts via the blog.
Continue reading Stick & Stones Will . . .