Richard B the EMT

As long as it is NOT the locomotive that's off track! That can get messy!

Figure a lot of "Dinner-and-a-movie" dates, plus, I have much time watching movies (and Jeopardy!) on TV, as I have the accumulated time from my birth in 1954. That makes me somewhat older than the majority of the EMT Cityites.

Must be geopolitical. NYC 9-1-1 is municipal, primarily FDNY EMS, with some hospitals providing their own ambulances, with the hospital name on the ambulance's side, and other hospitals in the system subcontracting with private proprietary ambulance services, like AMR and Metrocare. These have something like "Ambulances for XYZ Hospital provided by ZYX Ambulance Service". Inter Facility Transfer services are exclusively handled by private proprietary ambulance services, like AMR and Metrocare, as well as other providers, like a former employer of mine, Midwood Ambulance Service. I do know that there is, or was, at least one private ambulance service provider had a contract with the city of Yonkers to provide 9-1-1 emergency services. Then, there is the mode described in "Mother Jugs and Speed", where the locality has contracts with several private ambulance service providers, each assigned a district, with overlap if one area gets overwhelmed by call volume, the next provider will enter the first one's district. Some services, I am aware, will handle a 9-1-1, or a IFT call, based on location of whichever ambulance is closest, so nobody knows if they're getting a 9-1-1 or IFT, until dispatch calls them.

Lone Star, that information was creepy. I was using references in real life, and so did you. Yours, however, I had never heard of prior to you posting it. [s:5e88b1855f]My[/s:5e88b1855f] Our PETA postings, however, were intended, obviously, as humor.

Oh. What I have been referring to, as non 9-1-1 ambulance service providers.

Some of us, on our down time, go to the movies. Will Smith played a top secret organization operative dealing with extraterrestrial visitors, both friendly and hostile, visiting us here on Earth. For reasons of not standing out, he, and all the operatives, were simply dressed in black suit jackets, pants and tie, with white shirt, and sunglasses, hence the name of the movie, "Men In Black" or MiB. You know, basic nondescript government agent "uniform". This was before he portrayed a fighter "Jock" who flew a captured UFO into an alien "Mother Ship" in "Independence Day". And my lineman reference was Richard Dreyfuss, playing "Neery" in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind".

The abbreviation "IFT is unknown to me. Must be a local by you terminology. Wazzat?

To the best of my knowledge, NO state issues a full EMT "ticket" until the EMT candidate passes the practical and written tests. Such tests can only be administered to someone who is 18. That can be as tight as the test being the day of the candidate's 18th birthday. (New York State)

WHAT? Wow, that IS creepy. Last time I heard of anybody making anything out of human skin, and I am not making any references to the "Predator" movie series, was lamp shades, by Gestapo and Nazi operatives at the death camps during the Second World War. That last was documented at the Nuremberg War Crime trials, and I wish I HAD made that up.

Then I'm NOT going to tell you what all gets rolled, flown, and floated out, for a submersion/search in the coastal ocean beachfront here!

That reminds me: Were the MiBs at Devil's Tower, or just the Army and SETI folks? (Cue the John Williams music)

DirtyBlackSocks said I remember an actor named Dack Rambo. Stallone's character is John Rambo, a retired US Army Green Beret Sargent. Who is Joe Rambo? DirtyBlackSocks also said As I said

If this were to take place in New York City, 9-1-1 still would have been called as they (the BLS and ALS crews) are the "authority" to "pronounced" a patient DOA (actual wording is "Pronounce PRESUMPTION of Death"). The first words out of our mouths, if we even think CPR is either in progress or might be needed in seconds from our arrival, at a NH is "Does the patient have a DNR?" Before someone comments on this as FDNY EMS crews are lazy, remember, except for a confirmed DOA called into 9-1-1 by an outside ambulance agency, we're going to throw a CFR-D Engine, a BLS ambulance, and an ALS ambulance at it, and NYPD is sending a Radio Motor Patrol team. If we know there is a DNR, the first ambulance team arriving can cancel the other one, release the CFR-D Engine company, and, pursuant to our policies, ask for a NYPD Sargent "with the '95 Tag'" ("body tag" or "Toe Tag")

Was that guy a fired Indiana Power company lineman, with a six foot high 3 dimensional model of the "Devil's Tower", in Wyoming, in his kitchen?

Lone Star, we must have posted within seconds of each other!

PETA? Isn't that "People Eating Tasty Animals"? LOL.

Need definitions, from this non snow, or water, skier. What is the difference between "Alpine" and "Cross country"? Is it as simple as the former is going down the mountain, and the latter is going around the mountain? While on definitions, what is "Tyrolean"?

There is a string about an abscessed tooth causing a breathing obstruction, but I am going in a different direction. Elderly woman calls 9-1-1 about her equally elderly husband, who has a toothache. I was the EMS Call-taker, and I thought it was some kind of BS. That is, until the woman said the pain was so intense, that husband was describing it as moving down his jaw and into his shoulder. OK, this was the pain radiating in the reverse direction than I was used to hearing such pain/discomfort being described. I took precaution, and entered the call into the Computer Assisted Dispatch system as a Cardiac ("CARD"). Dual ALS/BLS assigned, and luckily so, as the patient went into cardiac arrest seconds after the first ambulance crew made patient contact. You have to listen to the patient, or those with them. You also have to know what to save, and what to discard, in what they say. Think of an episode of "CSI" that aired recently. Elderly gentleman, whose wife had died 10 years previously, originally was dismissed when saying to "CSI Grissom" that his wife was shot. Turned out she was shot, or at least her picture had been shot...with a crossbow! Using the place the picture hung, they found the spot where the crossbow attack had been launched, on the actual "then and there" victim.

As the song states, I'm "Stuck in the middle with you!"

A long time ago, I mentioned someone charged with assault for spiking the coffee urn with a diuretic. Therefore, I strongly urge everyone to not have the patient take Ipicac, to make them vomit to receive faster attention, as you could be charged, lose your EMT or Paramedic "ticket", and be incarcerated.

Syrup of Ipicac used to be in my protocols and has been removed, but a reminder for those who still have it in theirs: Ipicac causes vomiting. Do not use if whatever substance was swallowed caused burning on the way down, as it will cause burning on the way up. Activated charcoal absorbs the poisons/toxins, until the ED can "pump" the solution out. Never use both methods at the same time, as the charcoal will prevent the ipicac from causing the patient to vomit the substances out. As to indication or contraindication, if the option is available, call your on line medical control.

The simplest, as I see it, is still the 10 second scene safety check, and constant vigilance while on a scene. It admittedly does not always work, but for the majority of the time, it does. Failing that, try running shoes!

In this inference, perhaps "respectfully" is the wrong word...?

They're known on my side of the Nassau County line as (respectfully) police, fire or EMS "groupies."

Uh...is there some kind of football game today that I am unaware of? LOL. Meanwhile, back at the actual subject... I keep reading articles about how various Child Service Agencies are contacted by parents, as they are having trouble controlling their children, for an assortment of reasons, requesting help, and the CSA then declares them bad parents, and places the child or children into foster care. Seems no matter what you do, YOU'RE WRONG!