AnthonyM83

Woah, totally missed this until now. EMTs do not have an automatic duty to act if you come across an emergency on your off time. IF you did have a duty to act, though, you wouldn't be covered by Good Samaritan laws...like when you're on-duty. As I understand things. If you always had a duty to act, when establishing a case of negligence, you wouldn't have to prove you had a duty to act, as one of the commonly cited 4 criteria for negligence....it would instead be assumed b/c you always had a duty to act.

Yeah, I always end up getting mesmorized by the fires instead

I doubt they'd do that for us here for code 2 runs...

And again what I meant by that education versus training thread. I don't see training as a bad thing...training involves the mechanical stuff more, fluidity... As long as education to training ratio is maybe 80%-to-20% I don't know if it's that bad... Another way of looking at it is, I'd like a surgeon with a lot of education, but honestly I require that he's had a lot of 'training' as well...rote repetition of skills, muscle memory...it's not usually what you associate the word "education" with...

Call in Search & Rescue. If you don't have a team, get some mutual aid going. A SWAT team might also be available for repelling. Possibly a military agency if there's a local base? Not sure how that works. I guess do the best sweeps you can, of course calling out to the injured. Local PD or military might also be able to lend you night vision equipment if that's an issue...but really flashlights should do it. I don't know if there's mobile infrared...Since it's a confirmed sighting, you might get more equipment than you otherwise would from outside agencies. Of course, bring out the original witness with you to see which areas seem familiar to him. You can also be on the lookout for signs of him, like unattended vehicles or other equipment. You might try having the word spread around your area to see if someone knows of a family member who might be in that area and is now missing. Search dogs might also be available. If you somehow end up being the guy in charge and have limited experience, you should feel free to consult with heads of surrounding agencies, medical, search and rescue, LE, etc.

While I'm a proponent of further education, as I read the thread I keep getting the repeated thought: Can you truly understand what's going on without being a medical doctor?

Would this be a case of needing more TRAINING?! Or are we going to go back to it not being good education b/c education includes book plus skills smarts....

I second the FLIR. You can't go just driving around every cliff and peaking your head over to see if you see something.

A POSITIVE memorable impression on me that is...

Your icon really scares me...which I guess is appropriate given your screen name.

Wouldn't furthering your education do your patients more right? Wouldn't it make you more apt to catch things and figure out the tricky things you mentioned? And by proving it to yourself, I mean challenging yourself to be a high level provider, that includes education, but also rising above all that wanker stuff that you mentioned.

The medics usually have a quick reference sheet taped to the clip board somewhere. Sometimes they want the exact wording or it's an uncommon situation.

You will rarely see public behavior like that from the 911 provider in my area. We have lazies and we have slobs, but that's when comparing them within our company. I shouldn't have implied all transfer companies provide a lower professional image...but I've yet to see anyone who doesn't do 911 in this county make an impression on me.

You don't try to prove to yourself that you're the an above average provider? How do you motivate yourself to go higher? I suppose people can have different systems for it...

For sure. Also, if we could differentiate ourselves from them, I think we would have a better reputation with the public and local businesses and citizens in many areas. In my home area, you're an EMT and walk into Starbucks, you're greeted with all smiles and friendliness...here you're just another customer...they're all used to a dozens of different transfer ambulance companies (there's over 50 in this city) come in with half-tucked uniforms, uniforms consisting of just a t-shirt, looking like they just got home from a bad night at the bars, acting in embarrassing ways.

Careful, you're assuming all the transfer ambulance people want to work in 911. Yes, a lot of them got fired from a 911 company or can't get hired, but a lot of them have done the 911 thing already, like the slower pace, need the higher pay, can only work there because of school schedule, or responsible but just not old enough to work for a 911.

Also, if the job paid more, one could travel farther. There's a fire captain here in LA that commutes by airplane from Arizona (Tuscon, I think?)

Understood.

"Very Niiiiice"

Another option is always to let the instructor know by anonymous note (so s/he doesn't press you for info or discipline you for not divulging the name) that there is cheating going on in the class (like the person who told his school administrators) and what method is being used. Ask them to lookout for whose grade falls after they implement new testing procedures

As someone watching this from the sidelines, I think neither of you meant offense, so both should stop from carrying it out further. He misunderstood (I can see why), especially here at EMTCity where everyone jumps you for anything, and I can see why you're upset he slung back at you...but seriously I don't want to read the back and forth when it's coming out of nothing.

Ummm...thanks for that, but the issue's a bit more complicated like that. That's why there's the whole long thread. Read up for awhile and ask questions before making posts like that

NO. The provider should not have to take that because it's unprofessional on the part of the EMT and looks bad for the EMT company. If someone pulls the education card on me, I'll go ahead and pretend I'm uneducated and take offense, so they look like jackasses to all their coworkers. I probably have more patience than 95% of my company, but if I get the sense of superiority in a conversation, you're done. I don't respect most of the medics I've worked with because they put patients at risk everyday by sending them BLS (sometimes they die, sometimes EMTs figure it out & reroute/upgrade), but I still act respectfully toward them and when I put them down in my mind, it's b/c of their actions, not education level. Sorry if I veered off topic a bit, but I detected a bit of that in your post...

No. I guess it might be hard to distinguish at first read, but look carefully at the posts about L&S. It's dislike at overuse of them, putting patients, crew, and public at risk each time you use them, and driving erratically just because you're driving code. Oh, if a cop clears and intersection we still slow down and clear it ourselves, just because of that issue. In an actual escort, the ambulance isn't part of the leapfrog. The cops leapfrog each other and all our intersections are physically blocked off with a cop car sideways across the limit lines. It's still conceivable someone could try to go around...but I think it's more likely someone would run a red light and hit us during a code 2 transport.

I think I misunderstood the use of "man-power". Here we use that to refer to number of people on-scene....(I was saying if privates ran EMS and there a 400lb patient or an MVA with multiple patients, FD would be available to respond, since it's sometimes argued that the ambulance crew of two isn't enough)....but you mean actual staffing issues. Sorry, misunderstood what was meant by the term.