Kaisu

C'mon folks, throw 20 bucks to the site. It is more than worth it. When the excrement hits the ventilation device, and believe me it will, these people are here for us. It's a pretty cheap way to express gratitude and get rid of those f--n ads.

Oh sure.. cause it only takes about 120 hours to provide emergency medical care and we all know getting cross trained fire/police dudes there in 5 minutes is much better than getting ACLS there in 8. I mean, all those guys do is start IVs right? And as police and fire stuff requires ongoing education, training and practice, its a good thing that EMS crap is so easy.

They are pretty meticulous about making me throw out my 2 ounces of hair gel in a 3.5 ounce container, but the last time I flew (last week), in my pockets and my carry on bag, I had, among other things, 2 pairs of trauma sheers, an IV catheter (I know, it was in the package and I forgot I had shoved it in there on scene), a device for cutting through seat belts, and sundry other items that in my non-educated and ignorant fashion (cause I'm not a trained TSA professional) are far more capable of causing harm than the hair gel.

And a lock prevents this how? In the hospitals I deliver patients to, if I don't put a lock on (prior to hanging a bag IF NECESSARY) the line has to be disconnected to allow a lock to be attached to the catheter hub. OOPS.. beat me to it 1EMT-P. What he said

Hey.. they're the ones with the dirty pictures...

Hey all Once again, I am writing to purge my experiences over the last week or so. I live in Arizona - my mother lives in Thunder Bay in Northern Ontario. She is 80 years old and lives alone, but in a building full of people of her generation, and more importantly, ones that speak her language. After almost 50 years in Canada, she has never managed to learn English. Thunder Bay, at one time, had the largest concentration of Finns outside of Finland in the world. Her family physician speaks Finnish, as does her dentist, pharmacist, grocer, church, etc. etc. I was visiting her last June and noticed a clear cardiac problem. Mild exertion left her short of breath, diaphoretic and grey. She has always avoided doctors but I convinced her that if she was my patient, we would be heading for the hospital. She never spoke a word about the chest pressure that often accompanied these symptoms. She consented to make an appointment with her family physician. I wrote a letter to her family physician, who set her up with a cardiologist. At the beginning of December, my mother had an angiogram, which almost killed her. They had problems controlling the femoral bleeding, which necessitated a hospital stay as well as a return trip a couple of days after discharge due to pain, swelling and serious bruising. The angiograph confirmed mitral valve regurgitation and a minor blockage in one of the smaller branches of the right coronary artery. My mother is 80 years old, has been in controlled afib for about 5 years and with her decreasing cardiac capacity, has lost most of her muscle mass. She is malnourished (although obese), anemic (blood loss) with renal and hepatic insufficiency and relatively severe osteoporoses. Her measured ejection fraction was 38%. She has pulmonary hypertension and CHF. Just under a year ago, she almost died from an uncontrolled GI bleed, not calling for help until she just couldn't move anymore. On paper, she looked like a really bad surgical risk. In Ontario, the heart center is in Hamilton. The surgeon came up to Thunder Bay just before Christmas. He told me that he had decided against taking the case, but when he met her, he changed his mind. When I asked him later why, he couldn't articulate it. He said she had a "spark" and felt she deserved a shot. I was on the second half of a 48 (with about 3 hours of sleep) when I received a phone call that her mitral valve replacement was in 3 days. I did not have time to go home and get to the airport in Vegas. When I got off shift at 8:00am on Saturday morning, my husband had driven the hour from where I live with some clothes and other travel essentials. He had booked and paid for a flight from Vegas to Minneapolis to Thunder Bay. I drove to Vegas, where I discovered they would not let me on the plane because I did not have a passport. (Thank you Al Qaida) I am a Canadian citizen and a legal US resident for 12 years. My expired Canadian passport is in Wisconsin (where I have a second home). The would not allow me to fly to Minneapolis either. Apparently that is called "short-checking" and is against the rules. They did allow me to purchase a second full fare ticket from Vegas to Minneapolis but they had a heck of a time assigning me a seat on the full flight. I told them that they didn't need to assign me a seat as I would not ask myself to move from the seat I had been assigned to on the original ticket. The logic of this eluded them. Bottom line, I got on the plane. I was asleep in my seat before we even finished boarding. In Minneapolis, I rented a car and drove the 7 1/2 hours to Thunder Bay. The customs officials on the Canadian side were more than accommodating, waving me through and even wishing me luck. (My husband had called them and explained the predicament.) I slept for a few hours, then accompanied my very ill mother on a flight from Thunder Bay to Toronto, where we spent the night, then drove to Hamilton, where my mother was admitted pending surgery the following afternoon. I contemplated the very good chance that she would not survive the surgery. A three hour surgery stretched to five and a half hours. The mitral valve was replaced. The tricuspid needed to be repaired and my mother's heart was so enlarged that her fossa ovalis was patent. Her measured ejection fraction of 38% was in reality a functional fraction of approximately 20%. The surgeon repaired the septal defect. Mother had no veins in her legs that could be harvested for the by-pass. The surgeon decided to close her up and take what he could get. I saw my mother an hour later in ICU. She had the ET tube, 4 chest tubes, a central line, a Foley, etc. etc. etc. I had her dentures in my purse and her tongue was lolling out of her mouth. I couldn't help myself - I burst into tears. I'm glad she was unconscious. (I told her the next day that she looked like a Chinese Crested Hairless) My mother has had a lifetime of defying expectations. Her ET tube came out around midnight and her chest tubes were removed the next morning. I finally got in to see her around noon. She looked at me and said "When are they doing the operation? I've been waiting an awful long time." I laughed and told her the surgery had been done the day before. She was amazed. "Well no wonder there is blood on my chest" she said. She told me that she had expected to wake up in heaven. I told her "so sorry - you are in Hamilton" (if you've ever been to Hamilton, especially where the hospital is, you will get the joke). That afternoon, I got news that a family member, 37 years old and the father of two young children, had been killed in a freak industrial accident. He is being buried today. I could only manage to briefly acknowledge my grief. I will deal with that when this mess is over. My husband, God bless him, is taking care of our responsibilities on that front. In sinus after the surgery, I observed my mother's rhythm deteriorate over the next day and a half. She went to 1st degree AV block, then a junctional rhythm of about 60. Amiodarone and Milnarone were discontinued to no avail. She finally had to be paced with an underlying ventricular escape rhythm under 20. I was in the room when I noticed the pacemaker malfunctioning with repeated non-captured spikes. I also saw spikes landing on the T wave. My mother became nauseous. I had to drag an ICU nurse over to look as she would not accept that a patient's relative actually had a clue. The pacemaker was replaced. Mom is throwing the odd multifocal non-perfusing PVC (and once in a while a couplet) which throws the pacemaker off but overall the pacing situation is in hand. There was the possibility that as her post surgical cardiac edema subsided, her AV tissues would recover. They have not. Mother will be having a pacemaker implanted tomorrow morning. I was looking over my mother's records. One of the nurses had noted positive for dementia. My mother is sharp as a tack. Just because she doesn't speak English and often misunderstands what is being asked of her does NOT mean she has dementia. When I challenged the nurse, she went crazy on me because I was not allowed to look at the records without a physician being present. I am bending over backwards to not challenge them and to make a small a nuisance of myself as possible. Some of the better RNs actually welcome my presence because I can translate and I help with her care. Others are threatened. If you are still reading - thank you! You have no idea how much it helps me to publish these meanderings and get your input and comments. It keeps me sane. (and no smart ass comments about my sanity or lack there-of thank you very much)

looks like a married couple strangled each other to death....

ah Wendy - you are my hero!

If you are an RN, there are 7 Rs = the documentation as added and Right Orders

The woman is dead of an asthma attack Phil. I don't believe we have enough information to attribute any degree of responsibility for her death to these EMTs. That may change as the facts come out but so far, all we have are news stories.

Pretty sanitized version from the EMTs in question. (note they made their first public remarks from their lawyer's office). The family's version is second hand from employees at the shop during the incident. I would be very surprised if the "eye-witness" official hand on Bible truth and nothing but the truth will be what they told the parents. People love to dramatize things, especially in situations like this. We may have been a bit hard on the EMTs in question. I wonder if we will ever get the whole story.

It was heparin - one of the top offenders for in-hospital medication errors. Changes have been made to packaging/labeling since. It was actually before the problem with the celebrity twins that the "hep" locks were replaced with saline locks, although the nomenclature still remains, especially in the more regressive areas.

Stupid P O S - Thanks for sullying the ranks....

Bumper Stickers at Marine Bases "Except For Ending Slavery, Fascism, Nazism and Communism, WAR has Never Solved Anything." " U.S. Marines - Certified Counselors to the 72 Virgins Dating Club." "Water-boarding is out so kill them all!" "Interrogators can't water-board dead guys." " U.S. Marines - Travel Agents To Allah." "Stop Global Whining." "When In Doubt, Empty the Magazine." "The Marine Corps - When It Absolutely, Positively Has To Be Destroyed Overnight." "Death Smiles at Everyone - Marines Smile Back." "Marine Sniper - You can run, but you'll just die tired!" "What Do I Feel When I Kill A Terrorist? A Little Recoil." "Marines - Providing Enemies of America an Opportunity To Die For their Country Since 1775." "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Anyone Who Threatens It." "Happiness Is A Belt-Fed Weapon." "It's God's Job to Forgive Bin Laden - It's Our Job To Arrange The Meeting." "Artillery Brings Dignity to What Would Otherwise Be Just A Vulgar Brawl." "One Shot, Twelve Kills - U.S. Naval Gun Fire Support." "Do Draft-Dodgers Have Reunions? If So, What Do They Talk About?" "My Kid Fought In Iraq So Your Kid Can Party In College." "Machine Gunners - Accuracy By Volume." "A Dead Enemy Is A Peaceful Enemy - Blessed Be The Peacemakers." "If You Can Read This, Thank A Teacher. If You Can Read It In English, Thank A Veteran." "Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they made a difference in the world. But the Marines don't have that problem." Ronald Reagan

Waaaaaaaay bigger than koalas... and ferocious..

drop bears - be very very careful

So many of you have come to my defense with words of encouragement, offers of GOOD advice and general support that I am feeling overwhelmed. I didn't really believe in an internet community before but you have made such a difference to me that I don't have the words to express it. Thank you from the bottom of my tiny black heart.

I do not post from work. I have no time. Edit - and no.. it is not against company policy

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that the two involved are a couple, (I'm thinking engaged). Is there not a rule about personally involved individuals working the same shift? I know that at our station it is against policy (although it happens). If this is the case, there is a further blurring of professional lines that I believe contributes to individuals acting in an unprofessional manner. EMS (earn money sleeping) becomes a social club for some and the job becomes an intrusion.

LOL... especially in the the AZ... The thing is, if you start killing idiots, when would you stop?

I don't care whether it can be proved that her actions caused the death of the patient or not. Her decision to go to the far hospital was not motivated by the best interests of the patient but was in fact what was convenient for her. EPIC FAIL. Add to this that the medic admitted lying about the reason for the transport destination and there is no reason on earth that this person belongs in a patient care compartment or anywhere else that professionalism and dedication to the well being of other people is in her hands. And for this she gets 4 years of back pay on a legal technicality. The fact that the department couldn't get its act together to deal with this issue on a timely basis, not to mention its responsibility to ensure adequate standards for caregivers do the public a disservice beyond belief.

That "young troublemaker" turned out to be one of the best things about this job. She wouldn't dime me out even if she had cause. The person behind it is related to her and she is so angry with him that she can't see straight. I know she had a rocky start here on this site but she really is good people and my best friend here in AZ. Thank you so much for your kind words about me. It means a lot.

Prudent advice chbare - as usual, however, I have always had more guts than brains and I am not a stupid woman. I think my postings are a credit to my company because for all my faults, I have always been and will continue to be motivated by a search for insight, education and input all for the purpose of becoming a better provider. I don't like lawyers and won't get involved in a legal fracas. If my company doesn't want me around, then I don't want to be there. I am certainly not in the business for the money. I will not be intimidated to shut up. If I have broken company policy, I will take the correction. It certainly was not intentional. I am the one that has to look at myself in the mirror every morning (not a pretty sight now that I am in my 50s) and I can only do that if I stand up for what I think is right. I appreciate the messages of support. Believe it or not, this is me shaken and upset.