Continued
So while I was at the hospital Thursday night I got a call from Cary EMS asking if I could work the next day. Initially I told them that the best I could do would be to get there at noon, as I was already signed up to work the Care Bears show the next day at the Smith Center.
That's right, the Care Bears. They didn't die with the 80s, they didn't even die with the 90s, they're still going strong in the new millenium. Now they're touring the country, singing songs and scaring small children. I wouldn't even care, but they attract a big enough crowd that we end up having to provide EMS coverage, and that's just no fun.
Fortunately for me, there was already someone else signed up for the event. When this lovely fact dawned on me, I decided to call Jordan in the morning, and wiggle my way out of the event. I got the feeling Jordan wasn't happy, but I was saving Christian from working more than 36 hours straight, and saving myself some serious boredom.
After begging off from Care Bears, I swing by my house and pick up a different uniform shirt, and head to the station. Christian is a little excited to see me, to say the least. I don't think I've ever been referred to as "The bomb" 45 times in four minutes before, but he accomplished it.
It's 5 minutes after the start of the shift, and we're dispatched to a patient who's "vomiting blood".
We make it out of the station, and as soon as we try to cut the siren on we realize that we have a problem. Silence.
We continue on to the call without the benefit of lights and sirens, and call for one of the people at the station to bring us a new truck. We're passed on the way there by the fire department since they have the benefit of being able to drive code 3.
When we arrive on scene, I'm glad that we didn't drive emergency traffic. Our guy is 39 years old, and is very clearly not vomiting blood, or in any immediate danger. He's been coughing for 2 weeks, and noticed a little bit of blood in his sputum today.
This is the problem with triaging patients by phone. Our dispatchers have a very specific set of questions that they have to ask of any 911 caller. Based on the caller answers those questions, we have a different level of response. The bad news is those questions don't allow a lot of wiggle room, and we end up driving dangerous emergency traffic for a lot of patients who don't need us to do anything like that.
This guy is obviously not in any danger, but we load him into the truck, and drive him down the road to the hospital. Turns out he's a gospel songwriter, and he promised to sing for us if we ever see him when he's not trying to cough up his lung.
We clear up from the hospital with him, and head back to the station to check out and clean the trucks, and then take care of the station duties. After about an hour, we're dispatched to a structure fire, but we're cancelled before we even get there.
This leads to some interesting questions from the citizens of Cary. Here we are, a big orange ambulance with flashing lights and a loud siren roaring down the road, trying to get people to pull over, and driving through red lights. All of a sudden after we drive through an intersection we're cancelled fromt the call, and turn off the lights and sirens.
Of course, some dumbass yuppies have to call 911 and report the ambulance that's running around town running red lights.
Come on people.
After the fire standby, at about 11am, I make my first attempt to cook some lunch. I get my food out of the refrigerator, and almost immediately we're dispatched to a standby for Apex EMS as all of their units are out on calls.
We drive down the road and go park at Western Wake, and after about 5 minutes we're dispatched to the dialysis center down the road for a difficulty breathing call. We pull out onto US 1 south right behind CFD Engine 3, and haul ass. I love driving behind fire trucks because they do such a good job of clearing traffic. The general public doesn't give a shit about moving over for an ambulance, but they'll kill themselves trying to get out of a firetruck's way.
We arrive onscene, and find a 50ish year old man with one of the more extensive medical histories I've ever seen. Renal disease, heart failure, heart attack, stroke, implanted pacemaker/defibrillator.
Today however, his problem is the fact that he's a big pussy.
He thinks he's having another heart attack, but in reality, it's an anxiety attack. He's breathing too fast, and it's making him freak out. By the time we manage to get him to the truck we've calmed him down, and he's without complaint.
Since he's not actually having a heart attack, we get to take him to the hospital that's just up the road instead of having to battle traffic and everything else on the road to a hospital that has a cath lab.
We move him over to a bed (He complains that the mattress is hard. That should give you some idea of how annoying he was) and I clean up the truck. We head out of the bay, and I'm ready to go make another try at lunch.
The radio goes off.
We're dispatched to an old lady with pneumonia, but the rest of the story will have to wait, as I'm on my way to yet another call.
More to follow.
That's right, the Care Bears. They didn't die with the 80s, they didn't even die with the 90s, they're still going strong in the new millenium. Now they're touring the country, singing songs and scaring small children. I wouldn't even care, but they attract a big enough crowd that we end up having to provide EMS coverage, and that's just no fun.
Fortunately for me, there was already someone else signed up for the event. When this lovely fact dawned on me, I decided to call Jordan in the morning, and wiggle my way out of the event. I got the feeling Jordan wasn't happy, but I was saving Christian from working more than 36 hours straight, and saving myself some serious boredom.
After begging off from Care Bears, I swing by my house and pick up a different uniform shirt, and head to the station. Christian is a little excited to see me, to say the least. I don't think I've ever been referred to as "The bomb" 45 times in four minutes before, but he accomplished it.
It's 5 minutes after the start of the shift, and we're dispatched to a patient who's "vomiting blood".
We make it out of the station, and as soon as we try to cut the siren on we realize that we have a problem. Silence.
We continue on to the call without the benefit of lights and sirens, and call for one of the people at the station to bring us a new truck. We're passed on the way there by the fire department since they have the benefit of being able to drive code 3.
When we arrive on scene, I'm glad that we didn't drive emergency traffic. Our guy is 39 years old, and is very clearly not vomiting blood, or in any immediate danger. He's been coughing for 2 weeks, and noticed a little bit of blood in his sputum today.
This is the problem with triaging patients by phone. Our dispatchers have a very specific set of questions that they have to ask of any 911 caller. Based on the caller answers those questions, we have a different level of response. The bad news is those questions don't allow a lot of wiggle room, and we end up driving dangerous emergency traffic for a lot of patients who don't need us to do anything like that.
This guy is obviously not in any danger, but we load him into the truck, and drive him down the road to the hospital. Turns out he's a gospel songwriter, and he promised to sing for us if we ever see him when he's not trying to cough up his lung.
We clear up from the hospital with him, and head back to the station to check out and clean the trucks, and then take care of the station duties. After about an hour, we're dispatched to a structure fire, but we're cancelled before we even get there.
This leads to some interesting questions from the citizens of Cary. Here we are, a big orange ambulance with flashing lights and a loud siren roaring down the road, trying to get people to pull over, and driving through red lights. All of a sudden after we drive through an intersection we're cancelled fromt the call, and turn off the lights and sirens.
Of course, some dumbass yuppies have to call 911 and report the ambulance that's running around town running red lights.
Come on people.
After the fire standby, at about 11am, I make my first attempt to cook some lunch. I get my food out of the refrigerator, and almost immediately we're dispatched to a standby for Apex EMS as all of their units are out on calls.
We drive down the road and go park at Western Wake, and after about 5 minutes we're dispatched to the dialysis center down the road for a difficulty breathing call. We pull out onto US 1 south right behind CFD Engine 3, and haul ass. I love driving behind fire trucks because they do such a good job of clearing traffic. The general public doesn't give a shit about moving over for an ambulance, but they'll kill themselves trying to get out of a firetruck's way.
We arrive onscene, and find a 50ish year old man with one of the more extensive medical histories I've ever seen. Renal disease, heart failure, heart attack, stroke, implanted pacemaker/defibrillator.
Today however, his problem is the fact that he's a big pussy.
He thinks he's having another heart attack, but in reality, it's an anxiety attack. He's breathing too fast, and it's making him freak out. By the time we manage to get him to the truck we've calmed him down, and he's without complaint.
Since he's not actually having a heart attack, we get to take him to the hospital that's just up the road instead of having to battle traffic and everything else on the road to a hospital that has a cath lab.
We move him over to a bed (He complains that the mattress is hard. That should give you some idea of how annoying he was) and I clean up the truck. We head out of the bay, and I'm ready to go make another try at lunch.
The radio goes off.
We're dispatched to an old lady with pneumonia, but the rest of the story will have to wait, as I'm on my way to yet another call.
More to follow.
posted by C at 12:47 PM
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