Richard B the EMT

...and, considering I'm a Noo Yawker, possibly more polite, per both our stereotypes.

Anyone recall the rich socialite/widow, suddenly sporting a ginormous diamond ring? She said her husband, on his deathbed, told her to get a big stone...well, she did!

Anybody remember "The Peter Principal"? That was a book whose author posited that people rise to one level above their level of competency. One example was the 1st grade teacher, elected union delegate, always spoke to her peers, and that is including teachers of higher grades than hers, as if they were her 1st grade students! Your lieutenant sounds like he illustrated the point of the book.

With the caveat that I admit not knowing everything, even now, I have been working in the back of, dispatching, and driving, ambulances from the fall of 1973. Breaking that down, with overlap, Peninsula Volunteer Ambulance Corps 1973-1996, sequentially with 5 "private" inter-facility transport non 9-1-1 type services 1975-1985, and municipal EMS/FDNY EMS June 1985 to... To the best of my knowledge, here in New York City, EMTs and Paramedics are not allowed to go through pockets and wallets of patients; we have to wait for hospital security or the NYPD to do such looking for us. There is NO restriction on looking for medical alerting necklaces, bracelets, wristbands, or ankle bracelets, or going to a patient's refrigerator looking for the "Vial Of Life". While I have found such vials, I never found any decals on the front doors, windows, or the refrigerator itself, indicating that the vial was present. Nonetheless, it is a good idea, as almost every home, far as I know, has a refrigerator.

I once again voice my objections to the cell phone "ICE" (In Case of Emergency) programs. 1) If at an MCI, or anytime, I am not going to take the time to play with someone's cell. 2) If the MCI is from an explosion, unless the cell phone is attached to the patient, how do we know it belongs to this patient? The patient could have landed on top of someone else's phone. 3) Due to the possibility of secondary devices specifically for "getting" the rescuers, and such devices being triggered by a cell phone, activating a phone could trigger a call that would ring your bell...with an IED. 4) In war zones, the bad guys have been known to rig explosives activated by touching bodies and stuff on bodies. Again, touching these could end up blowing yourself up. 5) There is a very outside chance that the ID you read as "ICE-T" is not an "In Case of Emergency" listing, but a phone number for the actor playing Detective Finn Tutuola on "Law and Order-Special Victims Unit".

While not connected with your book review, I recall an On Line Medical Control Doctor, originally an EMT, who also taught CPR. Seems he was teaching a CPR class to a bunch of other doctors who got their degrees in other than the USA, and when he asked them what they were to do on finding the pulseless and breathless patient, almost all of them said to immediately defibrillate the patient. He then changed the question to, "you're on a public beach when... They answered the same. He then asked them if they carried a defibrillator in the back pocket of their swimming trunks. Therefore, what a doctor thinks can sometimes need a change of mind.

I remember when the first automatic Defibs came out, with one wire to a large electrode patch to the patient's back, and the other to an Oropharyngeal Airway (OPA) made of metal. Supposedly, while carrying a patient down a long uninterrupted flight of stairs, during the unit's field trials, the crew suddenly hears the machine saying "STAND CLEAR", and the unit charging for a jolt. I did say this was in the middle of a stairway with no landing to get to, to drop the carry device without injury to either of the crew, or further injury to the patient, prior to the machine discharging into the patient?

While still an incorrect reason to call 9-1-1, at least I understand the reason for that erroneous call

Sounds to me that the child must come from a broken home: the child broke most of it him/her self.

That is a point I should have made, but at least now it has been made. Everyone, remember that point!

Speaking strictly as a BLS provider, I am aware that if an individual is taking "Medicine 'A'", taking a "Medicine 'B'" can be contraindicated, so allergies may not be in play at all. Rather than telling us they have contraindications, sometimes the patients will phrase it to us as an allergy, like the often joked about patient on Phenobarbital who tells us he's taking "peanut butter balls".

Looks like I got it right, if partially, mentioning the Bends.

My desktop picture is the standard Windows "Stonehenge". (Sidenote: re the Star Gate Atlantis shot...I have a liking to "Dr Elizabeth Weir")

Any chance the patient is asymptomatic for (choose one of the 3 terms for same) "Caissons Disease" (spelling?), also known as "The Bends", or "Barometric Trauma"? I don't recall any readings making those exclusive to mixed gasses, re breather, or simple compressed air SCUBA diving from any of my training, or outside readings.

As I may have mentioned on that other string that I was unable to find, Firedoc5, I am a "Mets", not a "Yankee", just because I live in New York...!

NREMT-Basic, I can join in your confusion. Swallowing, to me, is going into the stomach, and aspiration is taking something what shouldn't be there into the lungs. Add a bit to the confusion, how many times have we heard of someone "Gulping for air" after being badly frightened, or after an unexpected heavy muscle usage? As for the "Freshwater" versus "Saltwater" drownings, per the article cited, the salt content has nothing to do with anything, which means I have to unlearn something I've "known" for over 30 years.

I'll stay on a low level of alert, possibly unneeded, until she posts on her own here!

I believe you, never doubted you. I had my ambulance "stolen" by a co-worker, as a joke, with a master key, when such items were available. He simply relocated the ambulance down the street, but I nearly had 1) a heart attack 2) the city on a security alert, involving the rest of the FDNY EMS command, the FDNY, and the NYPD. On second thought, the thieves, if pulling off something as I have described, might simply hide the ambulance until needed, steal the plates from 2 other ambulances (for front and rear) so the plate number might not still be attached to that ambulance.

Have not seen or read the story it's based on, but then, there was the bombing of the Marines Barracks in Lebanon, actually did that. Go to the movie "A Clear And Present Danger". The nuke that nearly killed the president, and tore up the city was in a cigarette dispenser machine, but could just as easily have been in a stolen ambulance.

They're waiting for the HDTV to be delivered, then they will do just that.

A paramedic from my station had a personal ad in a gay magazine (someone who was openly gay but committed to his own life-partner brought it in), showing himself nude from the waist down. He was wearing a t-shirt clearly identifying the agency! Best believe he caught flack from the rest of the station, and official sanction from the chiefs, for "Conduct Unbecoming"!

1) If this is not a joke, what is the license plate number? 2) Stolen ambulances are, as mentioned on other strings, potential weapons of mass destruction, and a delivery system for same. Small as they may seem in the back when taking care of a patient, just how much dynamite, C4 plastic explosives, or fertilizer/diesel fuel bomb material can be stuffed back there, and then, under lights and siren, just pull up on a "scene" at a local, state/province, or federal/national governmental center, or a sports center during "the big game", and... BOOM! Please don't get me started on "Dirty Bombs", or "Bio-Bombs". I will presume most, if not all, of us have had the tabletop scenario drills for this.

Me? I trust my Norton antivirus programs.

...And then, they wonder why the baby is so sticky...

You said that on Porpoise!