Bulletproof Vests for EMS

[AnthonyM83]

Here's a post Dust made in Aug 2005 when I first started with this community. I saved it on my computer and have shared it with others. Read:

Any street medic who can wear a vest but chooses not to is an idiot. Plain and simple. No argument, no excuses. I don't care where you work or when.

I never was shot in my career, but my vest still saved my butt multiple times.

There was the time I was bumped by a rubberneck driver and thrown onto my back in the gravel, tearing my shirt to shreds but not leaving a mark on me.

There was the time that my driver saw a stop sign too late and slammed on the brakes, throwing me into the front wall. The bag full of glass and plastic medicine containers I was holding at the time was smashed into a thousand sharp daggers between the wall and my vest.

Then there was the incident which ended my career. While standing up in the back of the unit (which was traveling at approximately 60 mph), we t-boned another vehicle, slamming me against the front wall. I tried to brace myself before impact with my stiff right arm. The resulting secondary impact broke my arm in three places (as well as a dozen other bones, including my neck) and drove my elbow into my chest hard enough to break six ribs. Had I not been wearing my vest, I would have been killed from thoracic injuries.

I don't care who is offended. If you are a street medic who can wear a vest and doesn't you're an idiot.

[spenac]

Here's a post Dust made in Aug 2005 when I first started with this community. I saved it on my computer and have shared it with others. Read:

Hey thanks for reposting that. I had forgotten. I am not worried that I need a vest for being shot. Perhaps we need to cowboy up like the bull riders have and start wearing vests to absorb some of the abuse we get from the bad drivers.

So what light weight, easy breathing (so it doesn't act like an oven and cook me), vest would be good for us in EMS where being shot is very unlikely but an ambulance wreck is highly probable?

[Doczilla]

So what light weight, easy breathing (so it doesn't act like an oven and cook me), vest would be good for us in EMS where being shot is very unlikely but an ambulance wreck is highly probable?

A Volvo.

'zilla

[spenac]

A Volvo.

'zilla

Can you give me the money? My EMS pay won't even let me buy an old wrecked volvo.

[brentoli]

Why, do we in EMS, think the tools and toys will save us?

Don't get me wrong, I am 100% for having a vest. It can save lives in many ways.

But, why don't we take the training we need to keep ourselves safe? How hard is it to take a 24 hour class on defensive tactics? How hard is it to take a 8 or 16 hour class on scene awareness. Even just a 2 or 3 hour in-service. This goes back to the galls-phenomenon. If it is in the magazine we must need it. Who gives a - how it works?

[spenac]

Why, do we in EMS, think the tools and toys will save us?

Don't get me wrong, I am 100% for having a vest. It can save lives in many ways.

But, why don't we take the training we need to keep ourselves safe? How hard is it to take a 24 hour class on defensive tactics? How hard is it to take a 8 or 16 hour class on scene awareness. Even just a 2 or 3 hour in-service. This goes back to the galls-phenomenon. If it is in the magazine we must need it. Who gives a - how it works?

Have you seen theses videos about how unsafe our ambulance is?

http://www.paramedicsafety.org/multimedia.htm[web:0d30683bc0]http://www.paramedicsafety.org/multimedia.htm[/web:0d30683bc0]

[brentoli]

I don't see them Spen? Unless my browser isn't being friendly to the site.

[spenac]

Scroll down their index and click on multimedia and it will show the videos available.

[brentoli]

Yeah its not working for me on this browser. Ill check it tonight.

[spenac]

And they have more there.