military medics versus paramedics

[Richard B the EMT]

Thank you, DustDevil and AnthonyM83, for your responses to my question.

Dust, my mom, reading over my shoulder, considers you to be political. Really?

Anthony, I am unsure of this information, but I think the Dublin type response you described was also done, either in the late 1960s or early 1970s, just before I started in the field, with a unit out of St. Vincent's Hospital, Manhattan, NY, but they also transported.

Mom was still reading over my shoulder and commented, on reading about Harbor General, but not reading to the end, and commented that it sounded like "Ramparts General", the On Line Medical Control for LACoFD's "Squad 51".

Also, early on, wasn't that about the time Seattle, Washington's Medic One program got started?

[Dustdevil]

Dust, my mom, reading over my shoulder, considers you to be political. Really?

LOL! Well, I do consider myself politically astute, in that I recognise the political component in all social and professional interaction. I suppose it was my recognistion of the "special interest group" role of the fire service in EMS. It's a valid label. And similarly valid political analogies can be found in all aspects of human interaction. In fact, it is equally applicable to the animal world too. Politics is the way of the world. The more you understand them, and the better you are at identifying them, the more successful you will be in living with them.

[AnthonyM83]

Dublin type response you described was also done, either in the late 1960s or early 1970s, just before I started in the field, with a unit out of St. Vincent's Hospital, Manhattan, NY, but they also transported.

Mom was still reading over my shoulder and commented, on reading about Harbor General, but not reading to the end, and commented that it sounded like "Ramparts General", the On Line Medical Control for LACoFD's "Squad 51".

Also, early on, wasn't that about the time Seattle, Washington's Medic One program got started?

Yeah, when LA's system started there were already a few others in existence, but I don't know how similar/different they were. I've never watched an episode of Emergency! but from what I've heard "Ramparts General" was meant to be Harbor General Hospital (including the screen shots they used). We transport there often. Apparently, you could sometimes heart radio transmissions in the background to St. Francis Hospital....that was actually a second MICN station they used.

I don't know any of Seattle's history, though...

[Dustdevil]

Yeah, when LA's system started there were already a few others in existence, but I don't know how similar/different they were. I've never watched an episode of Emergency! but...

There is no reason (other than the poverty that is rampant in EMS) for any EMT or Paramedic in practice today to have not seen at least the pilot episode of EMERGENCY! This should take up the entire period of your first day in paramedic school. It is a great primer on the history of the LA programme, and the paramedic system in the US in general. I seriously encourage all of you to go out and buy Season 1 on DVD. It's twenty bucks well spent, and you'll come away knowing more about our history than most of your colleagues. You know what they say about history; you can't know where you are going until you know where you came from.

[akroeze]

Dust:

I like what you're saying, but I don't think you're taking it far enough. Ever since becoming a medic I have always said that you should be able to watch all of Emergency and all of MASH and that qualifies you as a medic.

Everything you need to know is on those two shows

[AnthonyM83]

You can all feel free to mail me said series

I have watched MASH a few times when I was home sick in HS

[Kiwiology]

I used to be in the Army and I know a bit about combat medicine. One of my personal interests is the history of civillian EMS which has its beginnings with the French during the Napoleonic War if I remember correctly.

The Royal New Zealand Army Medical Corps (RNZAMC) teaches our medics along the same track as our civillian Paramedics, emphasising a clinical knowledgebase and competency in emergency and trauma care. I think it's necessary to know both sides of the equation - i.e. general medicine (treating a sore tummy or foot full of blisters from too much PT) and also traumatic combat injuries.

Note I said combat medicine because that is different than military medicine. I differentiate the two because on base in the military you don't get a lot of people with major trauma, gunshot wounds, ordaniance embedded in various bodily cavities etc. You can go along to the doctor and he'll take an exam, maybe take some bloods and give an Rx (and if you're lucky a day or two off PT). Out on the line there are people who have had limbs blown off, thier chest ripped open and insides shredded, who are bleeding profusely etc etc.

In that situation it's (arguably) not necessary to know how to treat a medical problem such as a sore tummy because this guy who has lost 1/2 of his blood volume probably and is seriously hypovalemic probably doesn't care. All he wants is some blood, those funny looking blow up MAST pants which seem to be used less and less these days, and a spot on the chopper to a MASH.

Now in saying that not every waking second of combat is er, combat. So if you've got said sore tummy in your foxhole at 2am then yes, I would want my co medic to be able to tell if I had a bleeding ulcer, appenditicis or a perforated colon due to the mystery meat we ate at chow.

There is a place for both but figuring out why my tummy is sore and how to treat me when I am shot up and bleeding.

[spenac]

Link

[Dustdevil]

Order today and watch them all in the next month.

Season Four will be released on DVD at the end of January! :headbang:

[AnthonyM83]

Seaon FOUR! Just now?

Must've needed a lot of editing...