firedoc5

Very true. It could go both ways. Guess it depends on the powers to be, what they think, and what kind of mood they are in.

I like that. One Chief I was under was totally like that. It was to the point of him interfering with doing your job and duties. When he gave you some odd order, jokingly someone would say that order was not in the job description. The Chief would say that the job description was to do whatever he said to do. Sorry, didn't mean to interrupt the initial topic.

We started having problems with the MS coming up missing from our drug boxes. It was actually by accident that it was noticed. Since each box has a pad lock and a seal it wasn't noticed by day to day inventory. There was a code and afterward when doing a mandatory inventory of the box by the lead medic, sometime's along with a nurse, the MS was missing. OK, they thought. It might have got knocked out or something. They just said to keep an eye on it. Some of us said to do an immediate inventory on each box in the system. But they didn't. Guess they were hoping it was a one time deal. But on another code, same thing, missing MS. NOW we have a problem, they decided (DUH). All but three boxes had MS missing. The "investigation" was a joke. But for about six months things seemed normal. The owner of a private ambulance serv. that I worked with for about five years had been in the biz long enough and he showed some how someone could remove the seal on the box without breaking it or taking parts off two different one's and put them back together. All new pad locks were placed and everyone assigned a key got a new one. But there was something odd started going on. Even myself noticed that on calls that required MS, the MS we were administrating didn't seem to be beneficial. Someone wised up. Whoever it was had to have a new key, so they knew it was a medic in the system. But instead of just taking the MS they were replacing it with NS in the syringe. Finally they found out who it was. No, NOT me. It was a medic that no one would have even been suspected. He'd been a medic for about three years. Was one of those tall, dark, handsome, almost preppie appearance. A new ACLS Instructor and on the short list for getting on full time with city fire, where I was working at the time. He had a gorgeous wife who was an RN. He was very smart, probably too smart for his own good. But he threw all that away over what all he did. Over that three years who knows how much he stole from patients, drug boxes, anywhere? He had large quantities almost anything you could imagine stashed in his car. Once he was caught he admitted to it all. It was about the time I was leaving the area so I don't know exactly what happened to him. But I know he was diagnosed as being bi-polar and possibly split personality. Whatever. :jerk:

I might get blasted for saying this, but it sounds like his heart was in the right place... Congrats on his retirement.

Miller was very lucky. Wink, the driver will be very if she is only suspended. But I don't think firing is called for, yet. But in the future, the three strike rule should be in effect. The backer has to be responsible for paying attention to where they are also. She shouldn't have been even close to the post. They need to let the driver know where they are at all times.

"What kind of training have you been doing, soldier?" AAARRMY ,SIR! - Bill Murray "Stripes"

"10-4, 10-4" "1 Adam12 enroute, 10-4" - Some civilian got inside a car and started playing with the radio.

"The Pusher" - Steppenwolf

That's good. I stole it.

"Good Sam., 5 Nora ??, ....we are attempting CPR but patient is fighting us." NO kidding. For real.

"Dream On" - Aerosmith :D/

Wow, we would have been close. I was in Jefferson Co./Mt. Vernon. When I worked with a private agency there was not really a given time line. But I would say on average it was 4-6 months for Basics. But for Medics it was about 7-9 months. There were a few of us that lived at the ambulance building and of those we would also notice things when they were off duty as well. Not so much for hire/fire, but for kicks & giggles, making it look like we were though.

We had one guy we called "Baby Glenn". Usually his complaint was SOB (and he was one). But he would be sitting at the table with his home O2 on and smoking a cigarette. Very bad COPD. Never could quit. He would rarely want to go in. He would have his wife call us because he said we had better O2 than his home unit. He didn't want to go in but wanted us to bring him the O2 and wait while he sucked down ours. When we told him we couldn't do that he would have a tantrum like a two year old. Hence forth the name "Baby Glenn"

"Shooting Star" - Bad Co.

We had another agency bring in a code while we had just brought a patient in and I was doing the paper work. So my partner helps with the code. The RT said it was "tight" to bag the guy. The doc was somewhere. So my partner scopes the guy, and says "I got it". He retubes the guy and on the end of the old tube was a glob of gum. The idiot who tubed him had shoved the gum down the guy's throat. He had NOT choked on the gum previously. We started calling it "Wrigley Syndrome".

"I graduated the 6th grade." - Jethro

We had a guy, family actually, where a sneeze or stubbed toe was cause for 911. Occasionally he had chest pain, and was "allergic" to everything but Demerol. We got called on him and he was in his usual position, even unconscious. But when Mary went to check his pulse, no radial pulse. But he did have a carotid of about 40. CRAP. Sinus brady on the monitor, Atropine, Epi. even got him on Dopamine @ 7Mcg/Kg/min, EVERYTHING, still stayed in Cardiogenic shock. Everyone "knows" that a person in Cardiogenic shock for an extended time won't make it. He was for four days. Then he finally came out of it. Less than a month he was right back home calling 911 because he couldn't take his wife yelling at him.

"God's Gonna Strike You Down" - Johnny Cash

"Hey Rocky"- "Watch me pull something out of my hat"

"Southern Cross" - CSN&Y

I know there are 206 bones, but we had a long drugged out arguement that there were 211. Two orthos had to settle the battle.

Great for you to do that, medic_girl_chas. I'm always encouraging folks to do the same. But I've never given. They won't take mine. Guess I got old tired blood or something.

It use to be we had a squad bench and a jump seat at the head of the cot. But now most on the road have a squad bench Jump seat, and with the newer models have a single seat on the other side of the patient across from the squad bench. They're coming out with all different kinds now.

I agree, driving age to be at least 21-25 and to have had defensive driving class (which is a blast). NO iPod allowed unless used for communication and only the passenger use it. It's like being distracted fiddling around with the radio to get a better station. A lot of agencies pull there's when they received them. I know of one Fire Chief reached in and tore it out of the console. Took them about two months to get the dash fixed. A good driver must be able to multi-task, even when not on an emergency. They must notice everything but not distracted by anything either. The passenger needs to be observant too. But, yea, how do you hit a parked vehicle, even if it was in a lane of traffic? I blame the youth, iPod, and lack of responsibility. Experience should come in there somewhere. OK, I'm jumping off my soap box for now. [-(

I know at a neighboring school it saved a fan who collapsed. Luckily there were two RN's there to help out. But the guy had by-pass surgery and up and around like nothing happened.