WolfmanHarris

So I suppose in systems with volunteer EMS this isn't so novel, but in this province every Paramedic is paid and a single role provider. In the last few month I've had a few other casual partner who are FT FF's as their main job and a couple that are LEO's who still work as medics casually. But in the last weekend I've had the most interesting partner thus far: - approx 55 y/o - educated as a nuclear engineer - worked as an FF in the London Fire Brigade for 10 years - came to Canada and completed another engineering degree - ran the Emergency Services department at a Nuclear Plant - now works as an Operational Engineer writing and reviewing procedures for the Nuclear plant - works casual as a Paramedic. (completed the then one year program for this while still employed in his career) On that note, who else has had some partners with interesting and eclectic backgrounds?

They could just be a bunch of D&D playing, 1970's Battlestar Galactica watching, cheezy dust on their fingers, skin so greasy it makes paper go clear, living in their mom's basement type virgins. That would be sweet sweet irony for a bunch of suicide bombers.

Welcome back bushy! It's been awhile; I think it was on the village I last saw you too. - Matt

You got me. It wasn't thought through and rereading it implies exactly what you described. Allow me to clarify. These masks have begun to show up on the trucks as a one to one replacement for standard N95's. Not universally though, not in separate cabinets and with little rhyme nor reason to when you'd find one vs. a standard NRB. No attempt has been made to draw attention to them or train on them. (I did just reconfirm this by scanning all the memos on the intranet to make sure I didn't miss anything from just before I was hired.) I did look at and open up one when I saw it doing truck check, noted the filter, but paid it little further thought until now. NRB's at the best of times provide a poor seal and when combined with the way pt's tend to fret with them filed it away as a gimmick. To say I wear an N95 as a matter of course referred more to my not counting on a filter added to a mask to mitigate my risk such that I would compromise my usual BSI precautions. I can't confirm without any doubt that we don't carry the multiple sizes of the mask as I'm not at work, but I did not see any other sizes. Certainly not within the oxygen bag. Without a properly fitting mask, I can't imagine a filter providing much benefit. Now the N95 oxygen masks that I've seen advertised seem to be a much better option and have been examined in peer-reviewed literature. Below is a link to a summary from Annals of Emergency Medicine. Unfortunately, it is not noted in this summary whether the masks were fit tested before being applied to the volunteers so while the results are encouraging, the practicality is not clear. http://www.annemergmed.com/article/S0196-0644%2806%2900942-5/abstract

Oh ya. We have those at work. Surprisingly no in-service on them and I'll have to check but I don't think we have the various sizes. I didn't pay much attention b/c I wear an N95 as a matter of course when dealing with respiratory complaints.

Peterborough County Council just approved $7000.00 to cover costs associated with Paramedics running flu clinics for Police and Fire by Peterborough City-County EMS Paramedics. (This is not the service where I work, just the county I live in. Was reported in the local paper today.)

Have had one "suspected" case. 8y/o F c/o N/V, headache, fever and aches. One isn't anything you can really average and my ancedotal evidence wouldn't be of any particular use anyways in the face of much better data available from Health Canada, CDC, etc. Gloves, N95, glasses as required if coughing, vomiting etc. (these I tend to avoid as with the N95 they get fogged beyond usefulness so quickly that I end up bringing my hands to my eyes to clear them, which kinda defeats the purpose.) I mask my pt with a surgical if not on O2. BSI comes initially from FRI precautions mentioned by CACC or pt. presentation. Once contact's been made if I no longer think the pt requires me to wear an N95 I'll doff it. Like mhull mentioned, FRI precautions have a really high instance of false positives. None. See above. Once again, I'm not going to let my limited anecdotal exposure trump the science. Especially when ILI has such wide ranging, non-specific symptoms. Yes for H1N1. Seasonal shot not currently available. Not required but encouraged and the hoops MOH makes you jump through are damned near coersion. To the point that when I considered taking a sick day following the shot, I was going to file it as a workplace injury on the grounds the service instructed me to. Instead I went to work. (Casuals get no sick days) Unaware of anything specific. Wipe down equipment/surfaces with virox wipes as is done after all calls. Before this gets like "Trauma" can we maybe merge some of these H1N1 threads? On a long enough time line they'll probably end up being very similar.

My Halloween night consisted of: - 85y/o F new onset symptomatic A-fib - 29y/o F attempted suicide (8y/o daughter in next room; she was all melodramatic and self-righteous with the cops. Closest I've come to considering violence against a pt.) - 8y/o F febrile, N/V, general weakness; parents worried it was an immunization reaction.

Update from my region: - In addition to the one at the hospital, the Regional Municipality is openning three Flu assessment clinics. These walk-in clinics are designed to divert people with ILI from entering the ED and quickly assess and identify anyone requiring further care from those who should return home. (Paramedics are not involved in this initiative) - Paramedics continue to help staff the public flu shot clinics. - Medic teams have begun staffing mobile vaccination clincs in addition to normal staffing. Current priorities are to immunize family Physicians and their staff. It is expected that this will be followed by PD, FD and similar organizations. - The Region has set up a few clinics dedicated to immunizing Regional health care staff, mirroring the programs run in the hospitals for their staff. These clinics have little to no lines and are dedicated for Paramedics, Nurses and other front line health care staff employed by the Region. - One of the three regional hospitals has agreed to allow Paramedics on offload delay to utilize their internal clinic along with their own staff. - Dispatch continues to diligently screen for FRI as they have for quite awhile now and medics seem to all be wearing PPE as appropriate. (Just observations from when I've been working.) There may be more going one, but that's

So far aren't we just talking about an ex-offender? This is the problem with posts that are barely legible, we aren't even sure of the question.

We have one single flight provider for the province (HEMS, fixed wing and Land CCT) for Ontario.

Perhaps the FF's in this department are as a whole resistings Dr. Tober on all counts. They may expect that Dr. Tober will be replaced if this continues long enough, or that they'll get their own medical director. (Like the 3rd graders who "leave and form their own better clubhouse.")

I thought the implication here was clear, but allow me to expand upon this. You are communicating in English, in written form, the onus is on you the communicator to do so clearly as that written communication is the only interaction the receiver will have with you. If your post is gibberish and takes significant effort to make any sense of, who's fault is that? I am not talking about less then perfect sentence structure, or impeccable spelling. I am referring to, as has already been mentioned, "text talk" and just plain laziness. I'd disagree with that. I have no issue understanding what you're saying. That's correct. I for one speak and write in Canadian English. I spell things with an extra "u," spell centre, no center and use words that may be unfamiliar to speakers of other english dialects. Once again, perhaps the target or my ire wasn't clear. My issue with grammar reached it's head with the double whammy of "what id a considered a good driving record" and "exoffender." Looking back on those threads, maybe I don't have a clear grasp on my on issue. Grammar and spelling is only part of the problem. The other part of the problem is that this atrocious grammar is usually found in threads where the membership end up having to coax comprehension out of the OP. If one cannot communicate intelligently, why should I assume a level of intelligence, professionalism or attention to detail when there is none of that present? Once again, this is actually what I was driving at, not nitpicking. I feel I addressed this above for the most part. Quoted for aknowledgement. SA_Medic, I didn't quote your second post. I hope I addressed your issues and clarified my own stance. If I have still managed to offend you, I am sorry for that and would be happy to further clarify my position. My basic frustration and position on dismal communication has not, at its core, changed. This isn't Facebook. Someone comes here to discuss the profession of Paramedicine and EMS. But I suppose this may just be a symptom of the lack of professionalism that plagues some segments of EMS. I gather the "his" you're referring to is SA_Medic. At what point did I, or anyone, say: "SA_Medic sucks at posting!"? Please point out where, prior to this post, I addressed any specific member in this thread? Touche. Finally, from the site rules: "Give reasonable attention to your grammar. Although we want to maintain a casual atmosphere here, this is ultimately a PROFESSIONAL forum where members of the public are free to read and draw conclusions about us as a profession. There is an automatic spell checker provided on this forum. Please use it. Do not post messages that appear as if they were taken from a 13 year old girl's AOL chat. "You" is spelled YOU, not "u." "Whatever" is spelled WHATEVER, not "w/e." And punctuation is extremely important to those trying to understand your statements. If you are too pressed for time to type legibly and using punctuation and capitalization, then please come back later when you have more time. AND NEVER POST IN ALL CAPITAL LETTERS!" AND, why individual members trying to address poor communication poses a problem: "6. You agree not to engage in moderating or administrating behavior. If you believe that somebody here is in violation of our rules or community standards, report that behavior to a Moderator either by e-mail, or by clicking on the "Report Post" button at the offending post. Moderators will deal with disputes and other rule violations privately and behind the scenes. Members who attempt to assume authority over their fellow board members by playing Moderator, publicly calling them out, or otherwise attempting to limit their speech, shall be subject to disciplinary action."

So this is not work related burnout, but it is something that I'm sure if affecting many of us and is starting to way heavily on me... absolutely awful spelling and grammer on the forums. I don't mean simple mistakes, like the ones that I'm sure are scattered through my post now, but flat out barely legible posts. It seems that efforts to address this in the read me fall on deaf ears as the attention to detail necessary to read such an important post, is going to be lacking in someone unable to spend the time on basic punctuation and capitalization. Efforts by individual members fall on deaf ears or face backlash. I will be blunt, if I have to decipher your posts due to poor grammer, spelling and sentence structure, I assume you are an idiot and will filter your contributions through that assumption. Regardless of how you perform on the street or in a clinical setting, in my mind you could not possibly be a competent professional. That being said, I can only ignore so much; I'm sure I am not alone. My proposed solution, insane as it may be, is this: new threads that do not show the most basic attention to proper English should receive a PM warning them to edit it or have it removed from Admin. I know this may sound harsh, but I believe it may be the only reasonable alternative to these individuals being tackled by other members. Perhaps I'm mad, but a "great" man once said, in a movie I only kinda remember but think is well known: "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!" Regards, - Matt P.S. Perhaps this should have been under Funny Stuff? I'm nearing shift change and I'm no longer sure how much of this post was meant ironically.

Paramedic at my service are now officially helping with Public Health at the community clinics and are now being set-up to run some mobile clinics in the next couple weeks. This is all above and beyond usual coverage and does not impact response in any way/

Check your local regulations. In Ontario to legally work as a medic you cannot have more than 6 demerit points. Which is essentially greater then two moderate (15-29km/hr over) within 3 years. Some services are known to not hire with more than 3.

See this is why I don't like helping people.

Location wasn't specified so... In Ontario you cannot legally work as a Paramedic if you have "committed a crime of moral turptitude" as per the Ambulance Act. Also in order to be hired ALL employers require a criminal records check with vulnerable sector screening (as do College programs before allowing you to take part in clinical). Given the high level of competition in getting hired, it is almost assured that someone with anything other than a pristine record will not work as a Paramedic in Ontario.

Welcome Gupta. I had the distinct pleasure of visiting your country for a month a few years back and it was one of the best trips I have taken. I am a Paramedic in Canada (as is stniuqs). If you are interested in immigrating and working in Emergency Medical Services, you might find Canada to be a better place to land. Here (for the most part) the education requirements are higher to work as a Paramedic and as a result the pay, benefits and working conditions are very good. As a Paramedic in Ontario I make a very comfortable wage and am able to support a family without working excessive overtime or a second job. This is not the case in many areas of the United States. Of course uprooting yourself to travel the world is a monumental decision, so of course don't take my word for it. I echo the other members of the City in offering my assistance with any questions you may have.

Voted other in the poll. We are not currently giving innoculations, but a survey went out to all the medics to guage interest and in the next few weeks it's expected that Paramedics will soon be at the public clinics. We haven't been given any more detail then that. It's unlikely we will see any medics giving the vaccine in house as the dedicated clinics for regional health care staff are this week. Ontario PM if you'd like specific service or more info As yet unclear on PCP or ACP, but I'd imagine both.

Boggles the mind. My current personal insanity at work is that my pants need to be taken in slightly and my shirt is a tad too short resulting in it coming untucked at the back constantly. Oh that and for whatever reason my shirt and pants are fading at slightly different rates creating an almost perceptible difference in their shade of navy blue. (Though I may be the only person obsessive enough to care on that one)

It had really strong, believable characters that were incredibly well acted. Good cinematography too. Of course not a super realistic depiction of LEO's (hell even COPS has to string highlights together to make a watchable show), but not over the top either.

Crap. I learned from that link that "Southland" got cancelled. That was a show I actually really liked. Damn you "Trauma"!

This is a great double-whammy. "Trauma" gone and "Chuck" picked up for more episodes. Nice!

I have a BA in Philosophy with an Emphasis in Ethics. Due to a lack of jobs in the philosophy factory I attended College for a two year diploma in Paramedicine. (We don't have associates degrees in Ontario and colleges provide all technical education. RRT's attended college for three years here rather then a University program though I'd love to see to Paramedic become a 4yr degree and end this BLS/ALS stuff.)