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As long as you are sure that you're coping, and not simply pretending to cope, then you have nothing to worry about. I have known very few people in this field that would be disturbed by the things you've mentioned, though I'm guessing most of us have had 'moments.' Once ran a call for a woman violently raped. Face pounded, multiple stab wounds, including her vagina and rectum. I left that call shaking with anger, just wanting to beat the shit out of someone simply because of the brutality of the act. Once the adrenalin washed out of my system I was fine, went back to work, and got to run on the guys that did this after they 'resisted arrest.' Made me feel much better. :-) Watch for the signs that you're bullshitting yourself about being ok. Neuralgic hypersensitivity to noises or movements, disturbance of your sleep, a revisiting of the call or images of it in your head uncalled for, changes in your personality. If you feel fine, you almost certainly are fine, though EMS is full of 'do gooders' that will want to try and convince you otherwise. They are a much bigger threat to your emotional well being than nasty calls. Good question man... Dwayne

Next time a gang banger starts shooting my way I'll just holler hey stop I'm allergic to bullets and they will stop shooting.

This is as absurd as claiming you're too fat and that the IV attempt is cruel. If that person was having a heart attack and they tried multiple times to start the IV for the meds and the patient was saved then that would be okay. If you have to be stuck, however, multiple times to be executed then it is cruel. Come on, you're being executed because you showed no mercy for your victim(s). Frankly, I think that executions should happen more frequently for more types of crimes and I don't really care how cruel and/or inhumane the process is. Violently rape someone...death. Molest a child....death. Torture a civilian....death. The list goes on and on.

This all goes back to Carlin's statement about the death penalty, before we stick the needle into the guy's arm, we swab it... of course we wouldn't want them going to (wherever it is you go after you die) with an infection. The guy threw the hail mary with a second left to go in the fourth quarter, except for him there was pretty sudden death, minus the overtime.

A woman and a baby were in the doctor's examining room, waiting for the doctor to come in for the baby's first exam. The doctor arrived, and examined the baby, checked his weight,and being a little concerned, Asked ifthe baby was breast-fed or bottle-fed. 'Breast-fed,' she replied. 'Well, strip down to your waist,' the doctor ordered. She did. He pinched her nipples, pressed, kneaded, and rubbed both breasts for a while in a very professional and detailed examination. Motioning to her to get dressed, the doctor said, 'No wonder this baby is underweight. You don't have any milk.' I know,' she said, 'I'm his Grandma, but I'm glad I came

This is a pretty straightforward question. What are some tips to help students gain some self-confidence. I have one student in particular who definitely knows the material and knows the skills. This student however lacks ANY amount of self-confidence. Positive reinforcement, compliments, encouragement, etc... just don't seem to help with this student. I'm looking for things I can do as an instructor to help this student gain confidence in herself. Any and all suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance, Neb.EMT

OK, I am very new to EMS and had my first call to a DOA. It was an older lady and she had been down for several days, maybe a week. For some reason it did not seem to phase me. Is that normal? I am more concerned with the fact that it seemed so routine and was not in the least bit upsetting or anything. I did help hook her up to a 3 lead to run the strip. We had a student doing clinicals and he had never done a 3 lead so he and I hooked them up and printed the strip. Is this normal or should I be concerned about my reaction. For some reason I thought that this would bother me more.

The Stand, Stephen King, Horror. An epic novel exploring the aspects of good and evil and end of times. I liked it because it has many levels and shows the complex struggle to be 'good' or 'bad' on the individual, group, macro, and spiritual levels. Can be read as a single dimensional story but much more interesting I believe if the layers are kept in mind throughout. Up Country, Nelson DeMille, fiction. A military investigator is sent back to Vietnam to assassinate a Vietnamese soldier that has supposedly committed some type of crime, I can't remember. What I loved about this book was not only the wit and humor in dire situations that is common with DeMille, but that I could actual smell the vegetation, and see the world that he'd created. I felt as if I'd actually taken a trip by the time I'd completed this novel. If you're looking for fluff, this is a bad choice. Straight From The Gut, Jack Welch, non fiction. Amazing look into the life of a CEO of one of the largest and most powerful companies on earth. Interesting peek into the life of someone that made billion dollar deals as part of his normal work week. Easy read, but no good if you want fluff. Maybe that will get your thread started. Dwayne

I think we often train a lack of confidence into students. The whole, 'You're ok! You did your best!" is SO destructive to the educational process as it simply tells me that you, as my instructor and temporary leader, not only believe that I am too weak to accept criticism, but to dumb to learn from my mistakes. Telling me that I did 'ok', or 'my best' or 'that was fine, you'll do better with experience' makes the instructor feel like a kind person, but it carries no information. If I can't trust you to teach me when I'm scared and defeated then I can't really trust you at all. What I need to feel confident is the knowledge to fix the problems I have today and the trust that my instructor will take me and my education seriously enough to help me do so. Also, I see too many skills taught as a single 'thing.' "Ok, this is how you cspine. Now lets everyone practice." At which point everyone starts to flounder around and bump into each other. (exaggerated, I hope, to make the point.) This is not one skill. Manual cspine should be practiced until they are comfortable with it, and then collaring should be practiced, SEPARATELY, until they are proficient, and then positioning the pt, separately, log rolling, separately, etc, etc. It's called Daisy Chaining behaviors. People fail at most skills because one part of the skill falls apart trashing the whole. Each part of a skill needs to be practiced and mastered separately before attempting to be put together as a whole. That's all I've got for now...Don't treat your timid students as if they're breakable, and daisy chain behaviors and I think you'll see a dramatic difference in their behavior as a whole. Dwayne

Shelling out cash, esp in rural areas, means taxing us all to death. It all depends on the population, the local economy, etc.. Then again, not every town needs an ambulance. I feel that every little dot on a map having one, is over kill. The answer isn't always consolidation, there is no answer in my opinion. There is always room for failure, whether because of a lack of planning, or running out of plans. If it were up to the municipality, there would be an ambulance somewhere, but they wouldn't be paying for it. In most US states, a municipal governing body is responsible to make sure every citizen has access to two things. Fire and Police. A contract for fire and police, they don't have to have a fire truck and a cop, they just need to have one on hand, somewhere. Ambulances, are not considered essential services. That may be one of the reasons, you don't see more paid services, in rural areas.

There is not just a whole lot that I agree with the NAEMT about, however this is one of those few things. I am against medical personnel performing executions, because it legitimises it as a "medical" procedure. If the state is going to execute someone, they need to man-up and take total responsibility for just that, and not try to write it off as a "medical procedure". On the other hand, if they maintain that it is a medical procedure, then they need to man-up and allow that procedure for people who choose to end their own lives.

Generally, I find myself not to be "bothered" deeply by non-gruesome, non-violent, non-traumatic deaths. It's part of life, people die, perhaps you've accepted that. If you're feeling badly, because you think that you should feel something, then talk to someone.

We're not animals because animals don't kill for vengeance. The animals are one up on us.

But it's not about punishment, it's about 'justice.' The death penalty is very controversial here and is a political hot button. The only way that the states that allow it can make it fly is to convince the general populace that it is 'humane.' No suffering. We're not animals you see, because we're going to kill them kindly. An anaphylaxis reaction viewed by those watching would simply give the anti death penalty crowd too much ammunition to fight, that is the concern. Is it a valid argument, assuming he can be shown to have an actual, severe allergy? I think so. You can find the Taliban beheading people all day long on Youtube and most cry in outrage, though the Taliban has found those people to be guilty of some crime. We should, I believe, try and maintain some sense of humanity as a society. I remain anti death penalty, not because I believe it's barbaric, but because I believe it should be disallowed until we can show a zero percent rate of mistaken executions. Until then we're murderers, not proponents of justice. My two cents... Dwayne

It was an invalid arguement even on a good day. The one drug protocal that is currently inplace is IV thiopental sodium. That is what Darryl Durr claimed to be allergic to. However due to botched executions in the past, and due to being unable to maintain an IV in some past IV drug users, the state of Ohio has a back up IM lethal injection protocol. Instead of 5,000 mg of thiopental sodium IV, they can use 10 mg of midazolam IM and 40mg hydromorphone IM. I was suprised they even tried to fight it with the alternate protocal in place. http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/OHLethalInjProtocol.pdf Fireman1037

Never understood volunteers, or why a community would not shell out cash to pay for medical professionals. It's quite sad really. I don't hear much about volunteer RNs and MD's...or volunteer hospitals for that matter. In my city volunteer fire/ems is unheard of.....This is a pro career, and we earn the money to prove it.

I have never done a digital intubation on anything but a dummy. I wouldn't see myself doing it--I'd rather throw a combitube in rather then lose my fingers in a entrapped person. Just my two cents.

i think a lma/combitube would be more effective in these situations besides going straight for the cric. Especially where space and access might be an issue. That's just me though.

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I wouldn't call that a bad career move, just a mistake.

Well I guess the whole idea of a good story really got lost yet again. Please dont post crap about volly or paid that isnt what this was suppose to be about.