Charlie 3

www.ncemsf.org ... National Collegiate EMS foundation... about 100 organizations that disagree with you. I volunteer for Brown U. EMS. We have 1 transporting 24/365 ALS ambulance, and are having a new, second ambulance delivered in June. We have 5 paid full time supervisors, a handful of per diem supervisors, and about 130 volunteers. Of those volunteers, a little over half are licensed EMTs, the rest are ride alongs. The typical duty crew consists of the supervisor, a medic or cardiac (let's not get into that debate ), at least one EMT, and two ride alongs. My duty crew, however, is a medic supervisor, a student cardiac, and two EMTs, so it varies. Yes, we are in an urban area, so it is not that long until the "real EMS" gets here. Unless you know anything about the Providence EMS system, in which case you know that the PFD has 6 rescues doing 30,000 calls a year, and asks for mutual aid at least 9 times a day. Furthermore, depending on the crew that you get, and the time in their shift you call, you may get extremely sub-par service. As far as call volume goes, we do about 800 a year. It's usually enough to keep me happy, although I wish PFD would let us do mutual aid... we're already here. Unions *grumbles*. About 23% of our calls are alcohol or drug related. We have an excellent average response time, and I can say with confidence that we provide good care. It's a great training program: on BLS calls, the supervisor drives, and the more experienced EMTs either tech the call or allow the less experienced EMTs to tech it, jumping in when necessary.

First responder on an ambulance? Sure, I like to have someone to carry my bags for me.

Reporting this would be preventitive medicine. Drug trade adds to all kinds of bad things like prostitution, drug abuse, homelessness, and theft. I think I probably would have keyed up the radio and asked for PD on scene, then they would have been obligated to do something about it, but probably could not have arrested the pt.

:shock: Island, maybe you guys should just get one of these... But seriously, what is your transport time like to your local ED? Where is the delay in, for example, detecting an MI early? Clearly being able to do a 12-lead in the field is in your favor, but are patients not being properly triaged in the ED, or are wait times for physician contact too long?

My goodness some of those are hideous. I like the Massachusetts patch, personally...

I didn't know you could buy them on the NREMT site. Now I do, and I'm all set. If you're worried about sketch-balls buying national registry patches, wouldn't you hope that an NREMT bought them on ebay, instead? I'm not going to, now that I have a better place to get them, but I'm just saying... This sounds fishy, mike? The NREMT-B patch means nothing in either one of the states I live in, so I don't know what you're worried about... I go between two urban areas (Boston and Providence), so it would be very difficult to impersonate anybody in any facet of EMS, as opposed to being in a rural area where some whacker might listen to a scanner and try to beat EMS to a scene. It's all kind of beside the point in this case, because I am *gasp* an EMT!

Cool, thanks for the links. Yes, Rid, I am nationally registered, but this is more for collection because both the states I work in have their own patches.

Does anybody know where I can pick up a spare NREMT-B patch? Google and Ebay have offered no joy. Thanks.

Do you have access to online medical journals through whatever school you're at right now? If so, definitely take advantage of that. I've found them to be an incredible resource for writing papers. A quick NEJM search revealed the following and many more... like rid said, be sure to site your sources. 1-20 (of 155 results) Immediate versus Delayed Fluid Resuscitation for Hypotensive Patients with Penetrating Torso Injuries Bickell W. H., Wall M. J., Pepe P. E., Martin R. R., Ginger V. F., Allen M. K., Mattox K. L. Abstract | Full Text N Engl J Med 1994; 331:1105-1109, Oct 27, 1994. Original Articles A Comparison of Albumin and Saline for Fluid Resuscitation in the Intensive Care Unit The SAFE Study Investigators Abstract | Full Text | PDF N Engl J Med 2004; 350:2247-2256, May 27, 2004. Original Articles Comparison of Three Fluid Solutions for Resuscitation in Dengue Shock Syndrome Wills B. A., Dung N. M., Loan H. T., Tam D. T.H., Thuy T. T.N., Minh L. T.T., Diet T. V., Hao N. T., Chau N. V., Stepniewska K., White N. J., Farrar J. J. Abstract | FREE Full Text | PDF N Engl J Med 2005; 353:877-889, Sep 1, 2005. Original Articles

The other question is how much experience you can get as a basic. If you live in an area where basics are only used for interfacility transports, your exposure to medical problems and trauma will be dramatically reduced. The same might be true if you plan on volunteering for a local rescue squad that only does a couple hundred runs a year.

I agree wtih Dust. I can't imagine riding with a conscious patient, especially one in pain, and not at least trying to carry on a conversation with them, and we have really short transport times. How could you get sucked in and taken advantage of as a basic? Maybe you believe someone's sob story and go out of your way to help them out, and get burned, but still... it happens to everyone. Most patients, especially elderly ones who have limited contact with the outside world, would much rather talk to you than listen to the air conditioning.

:oops: Sorry, I missed that one.

I agree that it's not an ethical question, and that the age when someone really should be able to be an EMT really depends on the individual. But I hear a lot of people in this thread saying that 18 is not old enough to be a medic, so I'm just curious what minimum age requirement they would support for both EMT and medic certification.

So, what age requirement would those that disapprove of the status quo be satisfied with?

=D> :salute: