Dustdevil

I'd be willing to bet that whoever is running those schools has very little education themselves. They certainly have no formal education on being an educator. They're living in the dark ages. If you can find a better school, do it. Who wants to be taught by people who know nothing about education?

Absolutely! That's the only place for a new EMT to be! There's just not that many non-emergency transfer ambulance driver jobs to be had in the rural areas.

It's evening out quickly in many areas. However, in much of the country, where EMS is dominated by firemonkeys, the female percentage remains pretty low. This, like your salary question, is going to have to be a lot more area specific before you get a relevant answer. Are these questions specifically asking about RURAL EMS, or did you just post all these in the wrong forum?

Well, from my time here at EMT City, I can see where the future of EMS is headed. That has helped me to understand the needs of the profession, and to envision my role in helping to fulfill those needs, as well as making a tidy profit along the way. I'm going to open a 90-day accelerated paramedic school in NYC.

I'd like to see pics of the dozens of fire medics that have been busted for drugs in the last year.

Wow... I have never heard of such a thing. :? What state is this? In big cities, they don't expect to know everybody. In small towns, they aren't overwhelmed by applications, so again, they don't expect to know people, they're just glad to have applicants. Sure, I guess it would be ideal to have a personal knowledge of each and every person I hire, but come on. That's not even realistic. Nor is it even a necessarily good thing. Especially if you know them from a bar. Personally, I'm going to be much more likely to hire the family man whose priority is at home than the party boy. Whoever you are talking about is just inviting wankers. I really don't think I'd want to work for this organisation. Doesn't sound like an "advance" to me.

There are two different arguments going on here. One is concepts, and one is semantics. Let's try not to get caught up in the semantics. If somebody wants to call everybody with a siren "public safety," then I don't have a problem with that. What's in a name anyhow? Where I have a problem with public safety is not in the name, but in the concept that comes with the name. As a health profession, EMS is a career profession where people choose it to be their life's work, devote themselves to a few years of significant professional education, and then put themselves into the field as a practitioner. As a public safety job, EMS is something that people with no education or calling take a civil service test for the city to prove that they are not completely illiterate, then the city sends them to six months of quickie technical training, and then throw them out there to pay their dues for a couple of years before moving to a ladder truck. That is the difference we are talking about, not who is called what.

...and the torch is passed to a new generation.

I remember you telling that story. That is so common in big city FD systems that it's not even surprising anymore. The things I've seen in big city FD EMS are simply unparalleled in non-FD EMS for pure shock value. If you want the ability to get away with murder and still keep your job, big city FD is the way to go.

My son just dropped in for a visit with me. He's still here. I'll be back later with the story.

LOL! I was leaving on R&R that day, so nothing was going to wipe the grin off of my face. :wink: Back to the topic at hand, I find that ease of carrying dictates what I carry. The CATs are the most compact and storable, so that's what I have in my IFAK pouches on my gear. But I also keep a couple SOF-Ts inside the STOMP. I trust the SOF-Ts more simply because they are sturdier, although they are a bit bulky to carry on your person. The plastic on the CATs worries me, even though they have improved them since the early models, and I have not personally witnessed any failures. And all that Velcro is a little complicating too. No such problem with the SOF-T, which could not be any simpler to figure out.

Geeze... that's gotta result in the mother of all brain freeze. :? I'll pass. Just give me steroids.

Wait... I thought Paris Hilton was #1!. WTF? :?

Some of us huger than others. :wink:

Hmmm... gotta read anything with Bledsoe's name on it! But, before reading it, I'll go out on a limb and say we probably think the same thing we thought about it when we discussed it here nine days ago. If Bryan stole that column idea from us, he owe's us a cut of the royalties!

I couldn't tell you that. But I do know she shaves and has a really gnarly c-section scar. The only reason I even know who Angelina Jolie is is because her uncle is a friend of mine.

Anything is better than gAyCU's! Zilla is too cool for that. I think he's more of a Nomex kind of guy. Hey Doc, I got a flight suit with your name on it out here!

Well, at least we know how to smoke ERDoc out when he goes AWOL in the future. The really funny thing is that he probably wasn't even looking for EMS items when he found that one.

Recipe: Take one firemonkey with no education and no desire to do any more work than necessary to collect his pension. Add six months of mandatory technical training that he resents because he knows it will increase his work and responsibility and decrease his sleep time. Be careful to not contaminate this training with any significant educational foundation that might give him the satisfaction of a true understanding of his capabilities. Simmer on the streets of South Central L.A. with patients it is hard to care about to begin with. Yeah... I just cannot imagine why medical control would lose faith in the paramedics there.

Certainly a valid point to consider. I agree this is a factor. It is an unfortunate fact that there are slow systems where skills retention becomes a problem, even if they aren't dual medic. There's really nothing that can be done about that in a practical sense. I wish there was. But those systems are simply going to have to make a bigger commitment to continuing education than others in order to compensate for the lack of exposure. Unfortunately, those are usually the systems with the least commitment to continuing education. It's a Catch 22.

Let's be very clear about this. There is a difference between struggling, resisting, and fighting. Those who struggle and resist get restrained. Those who want to fight get knocked the fark out very quickly.

You can't say "bulge" here. :wink:

I take it back. I have seen the MAT out here. Not in the field, but we did have a couple laying around at the surgical hospital I used to be at. I never really gave it much thought because it just looked too impractical for carrying in the field. I'm surprised to see that it was that highly rated. Very interesting study. They make a good point in the conclusion, that specific features have to be considered in context when making your own decision about what you want to carry. The one that is best for self-application is not necessarily the best one for use by a medic on patients. And if you move self-application ease and time down on the priority list, it changes the grouping. It's kind of amazing that the topic has become this complicated. TKs have always been such a simple concept and application for all of our careers. It's crazy how much research and development has taken place in just the last 6 years.

God, I wish we could get completely away from this whole "exciting career" image. :roll: It is such a major hold-up for our growth as a profession. I have yet to ever see a promo for an EMS agency or school that wasn't heavily focused upon flashy uniforms, code-3 driving, and technical rescue scenarios. Then those agencies and schools have the nerve to complain about the quality of candidates they are receiving. WTF, over? Isn't this about medicine? If it isn't, it should be! Numbers aren't our problem. More than enough people want to be medics. And most who become one don't stay because the excitement wears off quickly. Quality is our problem! It is those people who are drawn to EMS by an intellectual challenge -- and not badges and sirens -- that stay and contribute positively to their patients and to the profession. There are plenty of those people out there. We have to start making an effort to reach them and stop luring half-wit kids with no aptitude for education in just to spend two years playing hero before moving on to a union job at the local shoe factory. We're shooting ourselves in the feet.