Just Plain Ruff

You will get a number of responses as to which way to go on education, but my 2 cents is get a degree based education. As for the specific programs, I can't speak to them and you ask good questions, one thing you might want to do, to augment your search is look for facebook pages or groups that are close to you. There are more than likely groups that fit that bill.

I was giving this the benefit of the doubt, but there will be no doubt, someone with a budget to spend will think this is a great idea and then soon will be out of a job for spending money on this money pit. The only thing that I see this being any way successful is if this is run/PAID for by a university with a grant of some sort and they pay all the expenses. As soon as they can prove that it would be profitable or at least not a huge drain on current ems/fire resources they can maybe think about moving it off the Universities tit.

I'm not sure but is chat even a relevant thing here at the city. when it's been accessible it's been poorly attended and I think I can count on one hand in the past year that I've even seen anyone in the chat room when it was working.

Of course it's a huge waste of resources but every EMS system wants to say "we are doing as much as we can to treat strokes (insert whatever the buzzword of the day is) so this is our answer" This is a huge expensive TOY that I don't feel will serve but a handful of patients(maybe one a day or two) although, I can imagine that that handful of patients would be very grateful for this toy.

A recent University of Tennessee graduate decides to try horseback riding, even though she has had no classroom lessons to train her for this experience. She mounts the horse, unassisted, and the horse immediately springs into motion. It gallops along at a steady and rhythmic pace, but the rider begins to slip from the saddle. In terror, she grabs for the horse's mane, but cannot seem to get a firm grip. She tries to throw her arms around the horse's neck, but she slides down the side of the horse anyway. The horse gallops along, seemingly impervious to its slipping rider. Finally, giving up her frail grip, the girl attempts to leap away from the horse and throw herself to safety. Unfortunately, her foot has become entangled in the stirrup; she is now at the mercy of the horse's pounding hooves as her head is struck against the ground over and over. As her head is battered against the ground, she is mere moments away from unconsciousness, when to her great fortune......... Frank, the Wal-Mart greeter, sees her and unplugs the horse.

Yeah on number 32, had a lab tech one day tell my son "this won't hurt at all" and she proceeded to dig for gold in his AC space for a vein. Even after I told her that she would be hard pressed to find a vein there. She refused to listen to me and told me that there were no other lab techs available when I said that if she wasn't going to listen to me, then we wanted a different lab tech. . After my son nearly came off the bed the 2nd time while she was digging I told her to take the needle out, give me the needle and vacutainers (I worked in the hospital in the ER where he was being seen) and I proceeded to draw my own son's blood, much to her chagrin(blades in my back attitude) and with her on the phone to her supervisor. I got him with one stick. I was really surprised that they didnt just for spite come back and say my sample was hemolyzed but they didnt. So not only did she lie about it hurting, she had a horrible technique as well and refused to listen to a caregiver/co-worker who told her she would have a very hard time finding a vein in his arm. After I cooled down, my son had stopped crying, I was able to calmly tell the lab supervisor that she refused to listen to me when i told her where to stick him and she refused to call anyone else down. Needless to say that particular lab tech and I never had a good relationship from there on out for nearly 2 years. She was a really shitty lab tech. When I brought my daughter in to be drawn, she came in to stick her and I told her find another lab tech which she gladly did.

you have to be careful of my phones autocorrect voice recognition blood typing software as well.

Great discussion, I thought it was a thought provoking article but I think we might have stroked Ole Island out with his first response. But this is good discussion.

http://trekmedics.org/blog/uberdose/?utm_source=Trek+Medics+International+List&utm_campaign=ec960c617d-Uberdose6_11_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_115ff35e87-ec960c617d-84482817 To a certain extent, I think we all knew this was coming. For as long as there have been efforts to equip police officers and public transit workers with naloxone — “the overdose antidote” — to reverse opiate overdoses and resuscitate dying patients near instantaneously, it was almost a given that someone was eventually going to pipe up and say, “There should be an Uber for heroin overdoses.” Well, now it’s happened, and I’m a bit surprised to know that it’s us saying this — and that it’s taken anybody this long to say it at all. There should be an Uber for heroin overdoses. For all opiate overdoses, in fact. For any overdose that could be reversed if someone nearby happened to be carrying naloxone (trade name “Narcan”) and got an alert on their phone that said “Somebody’s on the verge of dying around the corner and you can save their life right now.” There should be an app for that. It’s not all that far-fetched of an idea, really – especially if you’re a drug addict who’s watched friends die from an overdose, or a parent who’s lost a child. Like bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and the automatic external defibrillator (AED) before it, one could argue that it was only going to be a matter of time before common sense prevailed and the possibility of saving someone from a premature death by giving them a basic life-saving skill would no longer obstructed by antiquated legislation or the monopolistic tendencies of the established public order. Untold thousands of parents, spouses, siblings, children and friends would likely agree: there should be an app for overdoses. But before I explain why I think there should be an app for overdoses — or at least an alerting system separate from the “public” 911 system (and, yes, full disclosure: Trek Medics has an alerting system that could do this) — I’d like to first explain why I think orthodox 911 systems alone, including your own, will never be able to prevent as many overdoses as it believes it can, and why an emergency alerting system detached from centralized emergency call centers could help immensely in preventing a lot more premature death. As a paramedic that worked along the U.S.-Mexico border until 2010, my colleagues and I responded to a lot of heroin and painkiller overdoses. Some of them we got to in time, while in others we got there too late — and still many other overdoses we never even heard about. Unlike a lot of the other deaths we witnessed in the course of our work, fatalities resulting from opiate overdoses were almost always preventable, and the number one reason behind every death was time: we simply didn’t get there when we were needed. There are a number of problems that keep paramedics from reversing overdoses in time, many of which centralized 911 systems cannot fix — or even cause themselves. 911 is only good when you call it First and foremost, in the U.S., Canada and other countries where there’s a unified emergency access number for police, fire and emergency medical services (E.M.S.), asking a drug user who’s witnessing an overdose to dial 911 and send for help is tantamount to calling the police and asking them to arrest you and take you to jail with all the evidence against you packaged up and ready to go for easier booking. No one’s eager to make that call. In the same vein, equipping EMT-Basics, volunteer firefighters and law enforcement officers with naloxone is definitely a good start, and certainly makes for good press, but it’s ultimately a passive approach with limited scope that leaves the life-saving administration of naloxone to largely incidental occasion — i.e., “I happened to trip over him while walking under the highway overpass and noticed he had a needle dangling from his arm.” Few, if any, life-saving awards have ever been given out to drug addicts While several U.S. states have passed “Good Samaritan” laws that offer immunities and/or other legal protections to bystanders who report an overdose in progress, it’s quite possible that such legislation, coming from the mouths of lawyers, politicians and police chiefs, translates in the minds of drug abusers into something more akin to, “Good Samaritan today, law-breaking junkie tomorrow.” I haven’t seen any data yet, but I’ve a suspicion that the instances of witnesses invoking Good Samaritan protections are probably pretty low in suburban and rural communities where everyone knows your name. Opiate abuse is typically an introverted activity Overdose victims are often found by emergency responders only after considerable trouble and in hard to reach places that are purposely removed from easy public access, making it very inconvenient for crews to bring in their gear and gurney, administer their drugs, and remove the patient. Such behavior is very rational: Nobody wants their spot blown up, and by bringing in the cavalry when maybe all you needed was someone within the community who knew what to do, there’s a strong chance the official entourage will end up scattering the people who will need help later to deeper and darker corners. This is particularly worrisome in the cases when there’s “bad” heroin going around: where there’s a higher risk for users to overdose, you don’t necessarily want to shoo them into the woods. In the event that a companion opts to call 911 for his/her overdosing friend, it’s often not before considerable efforts have been made to seek alternative home remedies in order to avoid the prospect of having to call 911 — including cold showers, face slaps and banging heads against the floor, to name a few. These are the panicked, yet predictable reactions of an unprepared community that’s literally choosing between life and jail for both, or maybe death for one and likely no jail for the other. This panic, reinforced by a natural aversion to self-incrimination, can be so pronounced that it’s not unheard of for would-be Samaritans to go as far as to drag their overdosed friend to the front lawn or street curb, call 911, and flee the scene. This effectively turns them into fugitives and leaves the task of finding the unresponsive patient to emergency responders equipped with sketchy information taken from a very reluctant 911 caller. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. These are just a few of the factors weighing in the heads of drug users who are witness to an overdose. The paralysis of the panic and paranoia — not to mention the adverse effects of the drug itself on the decision-making faculties — inevitably leads to delays in action, which further leads to delays in getting oxygen back to the oxygen-starved brain and heart, and thus increases the chances for both premature death and permanent neurological disability. And why? Because junkies and addicts deserve what they get? I would leave the right to respond to that assertion to the family and friends of those who’ve lost loved ones prematurely. Pomp vs. Circumstance There’s a strong case to be made that bystander-administered naloxone programs could be as effective as orthodox 911 systems in responding to overdoses, administering naloxone, and managing the patient, if not more effective. Such a system would undoubtedly be cheaper and would certainly be better equipped to provide post-overdose care as it could technically even include direct admission to inpatient or outpatient treatment facilities — something most U.S. paramedics are legally forbidden to do. By law, paramedics in the U.S. have basically two options to offer an overdose they just revived: “go to jail with this police officer, or go with us to the hospital (and jail after).” “Everyday they don’t never come correct” – Flavor Flav Equipping friends and family and fellow drug users to administer naloxone is also likely a safer approach to the prehospital treatment of overdoses than orthodox 911 systems can offer, and for two reasons: Giving naloxone for a heroin overdose always carries the very real risk of solving the medical emergency while simultaneously creating a behavioral emergency that can be equally, if not more, dangerous to both patients and bystanders. Being pulled from a deep, euphoric sleep to find trusted, familiar and/or non-threatening faces is a lot more manageable from a behavioral perspective than being awoken by a scrum of public safety personnel with diesel engines running and radios chirping. Imagine the circus: a couple of paramedics with weird goggles sticking needles in your arm (and possibly damaging your “good” veins); a handful of firefighters in suspenders and big pants; and two police officers with shiny badges and handcuffs, digging through your wallet. All of this for someone who’s quite literally just been pulled back from the great white light, and who now likely finds themselves in the throes of severe withdrawals. If there was ever a buzz-killer, naloxone administered by the full public safety platoon is it. About those needles: Thank God for nasal naloxone, but the protocols in many E.M.S. systems across the U.S. still require paramedics to start an intravenous line for patients who overdose on opiates. Intravenous drug users are clearly at a higher risk for having infectious blood-borne diseases. Not only does starting an intravenous line on these patients pose risks for the healthcare professionals treating them, but unnecessary needle sticks also put drug users at greater risk for hospital-acquired infections — a very clear sign that we’re over-treating as a society, if there ever was one. You’ll go to jail for this? Liability doesn’t really seem too much of a problem either, especially when you consider who the trained responders might include: like public health practitioners, community advocates and the drug users themselves, among others. Let’s be clear: Nobody’s asking the local boy scouts troop to respond to a heroin den. There are certainly more creative and appropriate solutions. In Baltimore, for example, the foundations for such a response team were detailed in a New York Times article about a program that trains strippers and bouncers in five minutes to carry and administer naloxone. It described these prepared responders as, “a group of health workers trusted and integrated on the streets, empathizing with those plagued by poverty, and meeting the people eye-to-eye to help them see another day.” I suspect people like these would be willing to risk the liability. Medical Misdirection Some of the major players in making naloxone accessible to the public at large include the E.M.S. medical directors at the state, county and city levels, under whose license prehospital professionals can legally provide care. These doctors decide what medical interventions can and can’t be performed by E.M.S. professionals and bystanders within their jurisdiction, and many are resistant to making naloxone as easy to buy as a tourniquet. But if the degree of uniformity shared by E.M.S. protocols across the nation is to be any sign, what these medical directors are deciding can and can’t be done isn’t necessarily based on evidence. This lack of evidence is true for many medical interventions performed by E.M.S. professionals in general — it’s hard, if not unethical, to get informed consent for a research study from someone who’s unconscious or believes they’re about to die — and the debate is definitely needed. But there should be little question left about the efficacy of bystander-administered naloxone in reversing opiate overdoses: this stuff saves lives. Similar to the debates surrounding bystander C.P.R. training in the 60s and 70s, many of these medical directors can’t imagine the public at large capable of performing such a high-risk medical procedure, or even doing it correctly. Well, it’s either that or death, and compared to the damage caused by chest compressions during CPR, naloxone seems little more than a nasal decongestant. Good Ol’ Uncle Pharma Of course, all of this talk about Uber for heroin overdoses is probably a bit on the wishful thinking side at this point as the makers of naloxone are currently under investigation for price-gouging. In Massachusetts, it was reported that as soon as the Governor declared opiate overdoses a public health emergency, the prices “skyrocketed.” According to State Attorney General Maury Healey, ““Our office has heard regularly from local law enforcement and public health workers worried about their ability to maintain supplies” — the moral equivalent of jacking up the price of gas as the hurricane evacuation begins. It’s a shame, really, because if the makers and distributors of naloxone just only took a page from the playbook of the CPR/AED industrial-complex, they’d be able to get naloxone in every first aid kit ever made ever again. Social Entrepreneurship At Its Purest There is one last reason why an Uber-style dispatch system run at the community level is not only a good idea, but likely inevitable: These are the times we live in. In a world where everything and anything is becoming available on-demand, and orthodox 911 systems continue to be a victim of their own success, some person will have the compassion, the motivation and the common sense to meet demand where it’s highest, and prevent a lot of senseless death. Since Sept. 11, the United States government has been pumping trillions of dollars into any and every public safety and health agency to prepare for terrorist attacks and active shooters, “even though”, as Nicholas Kristof wrote in the New York Times, “[overdose] kills more people in America than guns or cars and claims more lives than murder or suicide.” Perhaps we can do better. Maybe there’s an app for it. Or maybe we should just give naloxone to taxi drivers. Whatever the solution, it’s long overdue. ————————————— J. Friesen, MPH, EMT-P Founder / Director Trek Medics International

Those were my questions as well. I can't see them having more than one or two of these units at the most for the city of Houston. And for Kansas city or Johnson county Kansas, probably just 1. The cost would outweigh the benefit I would suspect. Get it out into a rural area and there is absolutely NO way to justify the cost of this thing. Plus the logistics seem to be impossible to get around in my head. But maybe there are smarter people looking at this than me! that's absolutely possible. My wife tells me that every day!!!!!

http://frazerbilt.com/Videos/watch.php?id=792 So, I didn't get to watch the entire video(and scratchy sound to boot) but this doesn't seem practical for any system but one that has more money than GOD. Logistics, the delay in gettng patients to the hosptial if they have to wait for the stroke ambulance to get there and many other things. Does the stroke ambulance get dispatched along with the ambulance and what is criteria and what will the system that uses it, what will their criteria. And let's not forget the risk of traffic accidents. How would you like to explain the loss of a million dollar piece of equipment because you ran the red light?

YEAH, that was typed in while driving down the road via my voice recognition software on my state of the art samsung galaxy s6 cell phone. I hate voice recognition.

http://www.ems12lead.com/2015/06/01/what-if-were-wrong-1/

I think you answered your question in this sentence but does anyone think its possible that they'll take me even tho they don't have a cadet program (or anything else for minors)? If they don't have a cadet program or anything else for minors then I'd bet one of my paychecks that they aren't going to make one up just for you no matter how cute you are. No offense intended. I mean you can try to talk to them if you want but there is probably a reason why they don't, it's probably because they are small and the station is unmanned. The best thing I think you should do is this, get a scanner, listen to it and when you hear a fire call, go to the station, wait till the call is over, wait for them to come back and then go up to the captain or the chief, he will be one of the guys, probably the one with the cleanest shirt, you will just have to ask to speak to him and then ask him the question you are asking us. He can probably put you in touch with the chief or the administration which might just be him. Be prepared for rejection or be prepared for a welcome committee because they might be shocked that a 17 year old female wants to be a fire fighter. I wish you luck.

Well as a hosemonkey(firefighter) she would fit in just fine!!!!!

Yeah I know, I was just being funny, I was watching the big bang at the time when I posted that.

Unless you are Raj, Leonard, Sheldon, Leslie, Kripke, and Dr. Gablehauser from the Big Bang theory, then you need advanced degrees.

had I have had the chance at 16 to become a emt, I would have jumped at the chance because my father had a scanner and we had the local fire station 8 blocks from our house. We listened to the scanner every weekend and "chased" them on a weekendly basis. I was hooked from age 6 on. Hell if I could have been a fire fighter at age 6 I would have been. The firefighters at station 28 in KC Mo would recognize me 40 years ago but of course, they've come and gone and move up ranks and retired and died. Past history and knowledge dictates that we learn and live. I'm smarter now though. if my son were to come to me in high school and ask me to help him get his EMT at 16, I'll help him but I'm going to put caveats and requirements on that help. 1. He has to finish high school, if the school offers the vocational option like I mentioned in my first post, that's ideal. 2. He has to find a service that allows him to work off his time while he rides - so for each 8 hours he rides, he has to work 1 hour in the station doing chores and learning. 3. Every CEU class that the service he rides at offers, he has to take it even if it's ALS level 4. he has to become FF1 and FF2 certified. (yeah I know, but I also see the future and Fire is really where it's at for EMS) 5. He needs to eventually consider a 2 year if not 4 year degree and I'll help pay for it just like my father did for me.

Finish High School first. If your high school offers a vocational school option with an EMT class then you can do that but if you don't have that option, please wait till you get out of high school to take your EMT Class. You only go to high school once. But like MCSOU said, anatomy/physiology books are a good place to start. I'm not sure that chemistry would be beneficial for an EMT, biology definately. You can go to Barnes and Noble or Amazon and get any of the books that you need.

More than likely you passed but on the off chance you failed, well you failed spectacularly because it stopped at 70 questions. From what I have seen on these forums and on some facebook groups, the ones who get to 70 questions and the test stops, they either passed or failed terribly. So don't stress out and go have a starbucks double express latte with sugar sprinkles on top and wait for the email to tell you your results. I'm sure you will be pleasantly surprised. Or we will be reading that you lead the police on a 500 mile long police chase all the while mumbling something to a news channel about "I can't go back and do it again, you won't take me alive:" or something like that and you'll just be another sad statistic of the Rocco Morando money machine we all know as the National Registry of the EMT's

well what a cutie. I bet I can find you an ambulance one. Give me a few. http://www.cafepress.com/+ambulance+baby-bodysuits https://www.etsy.com/search/handmade?q=ambulance+onesie

Funeral Arrangements Visitation - Monday June 1st 5-7pm at McGilley State Line Chapel 12301 State Line Road, Kansas City MO 64145 Funeral - Tuesday June 2nd at 10am at St. Tomas Moore Church - 11822 Holmes Road, Kansas City MO 64131 Posting for a couple of people who asked from my facebook feed. I believe Scotty from here knew Bill.

I also read anything medically wikipedia based!!!!! but seriously, I just got done reading some really good End of the world Virus killed us all books. Based in facts but scary as hell.

William "Bill" Bishop passed away last night. I don't have many more details but hope to have them at a future date. He was very well known in the KC area as one of the best medics on the truck. I remember him well as one of my Medic School preceptors and also a great educator of stupid medic students if you had a stupid question. I don't know how many times I went to him after a ride-along and asked him why this did this or a patient did that and he would explain it in detail to where even a medic student could understand it. The amazing thing about Bill is that he was over 400 pounds but he could do every facet of the job that any of us could, size was no obstacle to him and that is is what in the back of my mind, with my being a somewhat bigger medic, kept me going. I always thought back "if Bill could do this job, then anyone can" Bill leaves a huge hole in the Fire Department of Kansas City Missouri and surrounding areas. RIP Bill - go ahead, we got it brother. Last Alarm 05/26/2015

Vaccines and Autism - The truth, the myth and how Jenny McCarthy and Andrew Wakefield screwed a bunch of kids. Oh wait, that's not a book, well it should be. !!!!!!!