Cookie

I realize that.

Reading this you could have had my father in law. Only we, his family are the ones who transported him. Small community, we are all EMT's. Here is what went on. He started not feeling good, when your 89 years old, we hear that all the time. He has a pace maker and optimizer, plus he is insulin dependent diabetic, on blood thinners and so forth. This not feeling well went on for a few days, then he refused to get out of bed, only to go to the bathroom, refused food, meds. Finally after all attempts by his wife and one daughter and one son, and grandson to get him to go to the hospital, they called the oldest son who is my hubby. He looked at them and said I guess I don't have a choice. We determined he was severely dehydrated, and so did the hospital, so they slowly started to rehydrate him. Some where between the er and the room he was admitted to, something happened, he claimed his head hurt. They ran a ct scan, no stroke, blood work all within normal values. He was going down hill, altered loc and it was decided to get him to another larger hospital. We got him there and over the next few days they did numerous tests, stroke, heart, yadda yadda, the final one they did was a spinal tap, looking for west nile virus and encephalitis. By this time basically he was not responding except to painful stimuli. Test came back with a viral infection, but not know what. Suddenly he woke up out of his fog two weeks ago, started to remember almost everything except the days between the two hospitals. Not west nile but enchepalitis. Now he is in rehab and making great strides to get home. We knew he was doing better he is back to his grouchy, honery self. So we get to keep this 89 yr old for a while longer it seems, despite everything.

Congratulations and prayers for a healthy baby.

We just had a little bit yesterday, most of the heavy snow went east and south east of us. Most of it melted when it hit till over night and about a half inch stuck to things. KC and Wichita, and Texas got hit hard.

Snow is not to start till noon or after. Schools across the board, in Iowa and Nebraska have cancelled classes, including colleges and major universities. So just as soon as the snow builds up the kids will be out with the innertubes and sleds sliding down hills in pastures.

Ruff you and your family stay safe. Between what they forecast and what we actually get is a tossup. MariB, know where O'Brien is, next door to Sioux and one county below the Iowa Border. I don't know how much snow you folks will get. From the looks of things we are getting slammed from the south.

Where in Iowa are you MariB? I am in Fremont County.

We went to the store and got groceries on Sunday. Have the 5 gal buckets ready to fill and set in the tub. Got my moms coffee pot ready (old fashioned on the stove perculator). Propane bottles in the ready to use on the propane heater we have. Have 8 gallons of bottled water for drinking and cooking if needed. We have the tractors ready with the blades on them. We are good to go. Now if only people will stay off Interstate 29, if not at least drive according to what conditions dictate. A few years ago when we had the blizzards right after another and sheer ice on the interstate, we had people sliding every which way and getting cars buried in snow drifts. They did not understand why they were getting tickets for speeding when they were going 70 and that was the speed limit. Needless to say there were a lot of unhappy motorist with cars that were left because of a no tow order and tickets to boot. We are to get somewhere between 8 and 11 inches or more. Just have to wait and see, got my gear ready in case we do have to go out. Everyone else stay safe and warm.

The two local hospitals we go to have no wait times if you bring someone in an ambulance, walk in's sometime wait just a few minutes, nothing extroidanary. However I have said to all who know me, if anything happens and I have to go north to one of two trauma centers in Omaha, you had better not take me to xxxx because I will refuse care, even if I am unconscious to begin with and wake up in their ER I will refuse care and ask for an ambulance to take me to the other one. This hospital let my sister lie in the Er for five hours with a collasped lung, when her Dr. told them to put her in a room, my brother in law continued to ask why they were waiting and they told them they were trying to find her a room. My brother in law went up to the floor and asked around and found out no one had any idea they had a pt waiting, seems no one bothered to check for a room. Another time in this same ER she waited 3 hours with difficulty breathing and got up and left. They had not idea she left for another four hours. End of my rant.

AK: I wish you the best of luck in your new endeavor. If your as focused and committed to your new business as you were to EMS then success is all yours. Cookie

I read an article yesterday that the employee was from another country and did not know what an ambulance looks like. I say that is a bunch of bull.

I lurk a lot, nothing much to say. Lately progressing nicely after getting pneumonia big time, I don't ever want to do that again. Not the pneumonia so much as the dammed morphine and the shots in the stomache to keep me from getting blood clots. The morphine had the strangest people running thru my head, and the shots in the stomache burned like a sob. But on the other hand my spo2 is at 99 and thats better than the 85 something when I got to the hospital. Now back to lurking.

I know how you feel, first with my father in law, then my grandbaby who had rsv when she was about 6 months old. Had to step back and let the medic do his job on transport. It is not easy that is for sure, I have comiserate with you, and glad your son is doing fine.

I got within a hares breath of putting an expiration date on my birth certificate. I had a cold for about ten days, and thought I was about over it. Breathing ok, minimul cough, no fever etc. Felt on top of the world on Sunday. Did grocery shopping, help move equipment from one farm to another. No problem. During the night in the wee hours of Monday morning, I was chilled to the bone. Tried to round up enough blankets to warm me up. Woke hubby up finally he got me to the bathroom, and got me something for the fever. He went to work later, I slept most of the day. By about 7 pm. I called him and told him I was struggling to breathe, and I was. He rushed home and took me to the hospital. I had pneumonia. Blood work showed my white cell count at 36,000. You could hear me breathing all over the ER. The high dose antibotic Levaquin has done a pretty awesome job and by Wed. the blood count was 21,000 and today 11,000. The Dr. told me today that if I had not been in the good state of health I was in, I would not be here. This pneumonia kills people and I got very close. So I got to come home today, making a pretty good recovery. With a shot for the pneumonia, one for flu, an inhaler, more antibotics, pain meds and told to sit back and recover. After all that breathing treatments, mucinex, and anywhere from 12 to 15 bags of normal saline to rehydrate me over the course of the week, the only complaint I have is them dam shots in the stomach for blood clots. Those suckers burn like crazy.

Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth and I was doing my clinicals one company had the policy of taking their equipment with them when they left. While I was there they brought in a pt who had a fractured hip. They had the traction splint on, needless to say the ripped that puppy off that patient and pulled the lsb they had to roll her onto to get her in the amublance, out from under neath her, causing her to let out some of the most blood curdling screams I have ever heard. They had the same policy of not leaving equipment behind. That being said we mark all our equipment with name and town, whatever and we frequently retrieve them from Emergency Rooms that day or even days later, we have never had a problem with theft.