Dustdevil

So are the girls of Mass. Consider yourself lucky to have discovered both before it was too late! :wink:

Meh... I could care less who they are sold to. I could care less who wears them. It is the wankers who actually earned (using the term loosely) the patch that are embarrassing the profession, not the rare impersonator. Impersonation would easily be prevented if employers and volly chiefs would actually check out the people before they hire them. I really just don't see impersonation as a significant problem. And the patch doesn't give you the authority to do anything except maybe get Taco Bell for half price. :roll: Nobody's spending $28 bucks for that farking patch. I think the seller is shill bidding his own auction to hype it. Besides, there's just something wrong with that patch. Look at it. It's crooked. It's a reject.

So then, apparently Arizona is where Texas got that retarded idea! That's exactly what they are doing in Texas since they went with National registry.

Just like every other question, problem, dilemma and quandary facing EMS, the answer to this one is one simple word: The whole "scope of practice" debate was and is a complete joke. It was destined to fail from the very beginning for one reason: again, education. Debating scope of practise is putting the cart before the horse. Until there is a nationwide standard of education (as opposed to training) that reflects a professionally educated workforce, the debate is headed nowhere. I damn sure know I would not vote for an advanced scope for US EMT's or medics with most of them being so pitifully trained and uneducated. And neither would most of the movers and shakers in this industry. It is one of the biggest reasons why, in the end, even staunch supporters like Dr. Bledsoe (author of the most popular paramedic textbook and a former paramedic) backed out of the push for a national scope of practise. Nobody was willing to raise their educational standards to a point where anybody with half a brain would advocate advanced practise. So that's the answer. Education. Improve it drastically and our profession will improve drastically in every conceivable way. Scope of practise. Pay. Respect. Recruiting. Conditions. You name it. This really isn't hard to fix at all. The problem is, as is clearly shown by this particular thread, more than half the people in EMS don't want no more of that book learnin'. They just want more drugs, more skills, more respect, and more money for the 120 hours of training they already have. :roll:

Actually, there is. And if you don't like the sound of it, avoid nursing school at all costs. This whole thing reminds me of Bonsai Kittens.

Word. This is not likely to be your garden variety seizure. We've got a whole syndrome going on here that is serious. Regardless of the etiology, and regardless of what your cookbook says, think this one through logically and you'll do good.

If you have the manpower to escort the medic in, you probably have the manpower to escort the patient out. That should be their priority. A medic at the victim's side isn't going to do much good if he can't get him to definitive care. And giving the medic a gun (which, by the way, I am not fully opposed to) isn't going to get him to the patient's side any faster.

I did neither. I asked you if you were comparing the two so I could know for sure. Sorry you misunderstood me.

Congratulations. You have just shown yourself to believe in the number one most hated thing on this board: all scope and no education. "Skills" based medicine without a sufficient concern for the knowledge foundation of the practitioners. Doing things "because we can" as opposed to "because we should." All that is required for any medical intervention is a protocol saying "we can." Nice. :roll: Your skillset is not a penis extension. It will not compensate for the shortcomings of your education. I don't care what your monkeys have been "trained" to do. I want to know how well they have educated in order to make the sound clinical judgements (not following a cookbook recipe) necessary to safely provide advanced life support. Want to impress us? Show us a breakdown of the EMT curriculum that is required of your people practising at this level. Show us that they had at least as much medical education required before putting drugs into human beings as they had fire training before squirting water on grass fires. I'd bet money it doesn't even come close.

That whole theory has been thoroughly shot to hell here so many times that it is a running joke. I'll buy into that silliness the day that every other medical profession starts requiring "a reasonable time" of working at a lower level of education and responsibility before attending their school. Funny, I don't recall nursing school requiring me to be an LVN for two years before applying. And I can assure you that med school doesn't care if you spend two years as a nurse before applying In fact, most times they will hold it against you. Did your EMT school require two years as a First Responder before applying? Did your First Responder school require two years of Advanced First Aid certification before applying? Don't be ridiculous. If your paramedic school is turning out functional illiterates, that is the fault of your school. Don't blame it on the students lack of experience. It is your job to give them that experience. If you aren't doing so, your school sucks.

At one hospital I worked at, the x-ray techs glued a bogus knob to the front of the film processor that wasn't attached to anything and labelled it "Processor Speed" with an arrow for "Faster." It did nothing, but it was entertaining, nonetheless. When some resident would come in yelling "where are my films," they would reach down and turn it to appease him.

That's a given. The question is, what is better? Has NC found something "better," or is it just different? Are you saying I would find NC's exam significantly more challenging than NR? Have you taken NR in order to objectively compare them? Tell us what the rest of the country can learn from NC. In my experience, the majority of those who don't want to take NR are afraid of the challenge. Afraid of finding out they aren't as good as they think they are. Afraid of finding out they don't know as much as they think they know. It's easier to just continue to believe that "I passed my state test, and that's good enough." So what is "the answer to our problems?"

And they suck.

If it weren't for the constant discussion on this board, I wouldn't even remember what the minimum score on NR was, and I took it only a few months ago. :? I definitely can't remember what the required score was on NCLEX. And the whole test format has changed from when Rid and I took it. Hopefully he has more current info on this than I do. I believe it is still as it was before, which is an almost completely scenario based exam, just like NR, that requires you to assess a patient and choose the appropriate course of action for him or her. That is what NR is trying to emulate. Unfortunately, they have retards writing the questions.

LMAO! So sad. So funny. But so true! :shock:

Correct and correct. And it was a totally valid analogy. If you disagree, defend it instead of crying and playing the victim with this absurd claim that you have been personally attacked. :roll:

It's spelled "cynicism." There is a spell-check feature here for your convenience. If you believe that post had either anger or cynicism in it, you obviously do not understand the words. It had neither. Perhaps you meant "sarcasm?" I'll admit to that. If your state is sending inadequately trained individuals without a sufficient medical education and foundation out to perform advanced medical interventions, that does indeed mean that they have done a horrible job of addressing your "issues." Poor educational standards is the issue. WTF are you talking about? Who attacked you? :roll:

That's neither the point nor the question. The point is that those requirements and standards are embarrassingly low and dangerously inadequate, no matter what the state says. I am not at all impressed when the government tells me that something is "good enough." As we all know, government standards are always a measure of the absolute minimum they will let you get by with, and nothing more. Doesn't mean it's ideal. Doesn't even mean it's safe. Just acceptable. Not exatly confidence inspiring. Sorry, but I expect more than that from a healthcare professional.

The search button is your friend. Multiple topics here outline all the options in NYC. Good luck!

I could write a curriculum that gave your basics "extensive training" on the performance of appendectomies in a week. In a week, we could teach any basic to perform an appy just as well most any surgical resident. After all, it's just a skill. Only a few small muscles and vessels involved. Anybody can learn it. And nothing usually goes wrong anyhow. If it does, they can just call for ALS intercept! How about we do that?

Hmmm... I was thinking a little differently. Wheras if a doctor or nurse makes a mistake, it is usually no big deal. When a medic makes a mistake, it is usually in a critical situation where severe consequences are more likely. And since EMS management tends to not give a fark about their easily replaceable, dime a dozen employees, an EMT is much more likely to get fired for a simple mistake than a doctor or nurse too. It is unfortunate that more EMS management doesn't think like Rogue. Most EMS managers only use your honesty as an excuse to can you. Of course, we use the term "management" very loosely in EMS too since most of them are clueless as to how to professionally manage human beings.

I wouldn't watch any of those stupid shows. Not even if Alyssa Milano was in them. 8) And anybody who thinks the television story lines are even half as interesting as real life EMS must be a rookie. :wink:

So are the taxes and high costs of living.

I don't know about the others, but Philips has fifteen buck adapters that make all devices compatible with all pads. The adapter is bright yellow. If you stick a bright orange "DO NOT DISCARD" tag or ribbon on it, and have people that watch wtf they are doing, they won't get lost anymore than cables get lost. I can't imagine buying an inferior device just so the firemonkeys' pads didn't have to be changed. :?

I'm not sure I understand what y'all are talking about here. Electrodes? Pads? Electrodes are universal. Pad adapters are fifteen bucks. And if the hospital doesn't want to spend fifteen bucks for a couple of adapters, why should we care if they have to replace the defib pads on all their patients. I just don't see what concern any of this is to EMS.