Illinois state EMT B exam

[EMTBASIC_911_911]

I tested for my EMT-B state licence back in June of 2007. After my instrutor told us that NREMT had a pass rate of about 40% on the first try where State exam had a 60% pass rate on the first attempt. Luckily I was in that 60%!

I was quite disappointed with the State exam though. I thought that it had some rather interesting questions and it did make you think. While I was testing I came across 2 questions that I felt one was absolutley rediculous and the other one's correct answer was rather interesting.

The first question I came across asked "When is it ok not to take BSI precautions?"

it had answers like, During child birth, an arterial bleed, When treating an AIDS pt, or during an MCI...

After thinking about this redicuous question, and knowing that you Always take BSI precautions, I finally just put down Arterial bleed. Reason being, if someone was bleeding like that, unless pressure is being held there, they will bleed out.

I continued on with the questions and came across another one. This one was very interesting when I found out the answer.

"How do you transport a pt down a hill?"

I answered feet first....I dont remember what the possible answers were besides feet or head first. But I put feet first down, because if someone has a head injury transporting them head first would send the blood to their head and also creat pressure.....

After I was done testing, I told my instructor about those questions and if I passed, I just passed (I honestly expected to take the test again), My instructor after heariing the questions told me that in our book, It says flat out you dont need to take BSI precautions when treating an AIDS pt!!!!!!!!! Then he informed me that our book also states that you transport a pt Head first down a hill/incline.

Since my testing of the Illinois State exam, they have made changes to the exam, But Im wondering if State exam had questions like that what on earth will the NREMT have? I was very shocked that there were little to no Cardiac questions on the exam. I had only one cardiac question. I had alot of OB questions but it seemed that the test didnt focous on questioning us on things you are more likely to see everyday. So all in all I was highly disappointed with the State exam for Illinois....Anyone else take the illinois exam and feel the same?

[Dustdevil]

While I was testing I came across 2 questions that I felt one was absolutley rediculous and the other one's correct answer was rather interesting.

I take it they never asked you how to spell r-i-d-i-c-u-l-o-u-s. :wink:

The first question I came across asked "When is it ok not to take BSI precautions?"

it had answers like, During child birth, an arterial bleed, When treating an AIDS pt, or during an MCI...

I agree, this is a horrible question, written by morons. Although, that is assuming that you are giving us the answers exactly as they were written on the test, which may be an unfair assumption.

• Childbirth - No

Arterial Bleed - No

AIDS patient - what kind of treatment are you giving? You make it sound like they are suggesting that you can do anything with an AIDS patient without concern, which is bullshit. There is a reason we call them UNIVERSAL precautions. If the question was really worded like that, then whoever wrote and approved it should be sacked for stupidity.

MCI - What are you doing at this MCI? Are you the Triage Officer? Communications Officer? Communications Officer? Incident Commander? None of those positions would require BSI.

• The first two choices are clearly not the right answer. No chance. AIDS is obviously the answer they were looking for, simply because it is politically correct. However, it's still bullshit. MCI is the closest thing there is to a correct answer there, but even then, only if you are in a non patient-contact position.

By chance, did the question specifically state what your exact interaction with the AIDS patient was? I mean, if they said you were just staring at them during an IFT, then maybe that would be correct. But if you were having any patient contact, the term UNIVERSAL precautions comes into play.

I hate this political correctness crap creeping into our curriculum and bastardising the process. Sounds like the Illinoise gurus may be idiots.

[Scaramedic]

Moronic question.

On soap box..

PPE/BSI is the standard for all calls. I don't give a damn if I am going to upset an AIDS patient because I am wearing gloves. This AIDS bullsh*t has gone too far. The whole world can know if you have Herpes or Gonorrhea, but if your HIV/AIDS then you have special rights in some idiots mind.

Why is HIV so prevalent among gay males? Because they were the ones having unprotected sex in bath houses while the disease spread like wildfire. Some local politicians tried to close the bath house in San Francisco and got slammed for being homophobic so the bathhouses stayed open. In turn, as the title of a great book says The Band Played On. This went on in LA and New York also. HIV spread amongst the population that refused to acknowledge it and when they finally did they demanded special rights of privacy.

The government as a whole was slow to respond and that also lead to the outbreak. So to make up for their stupidity they put the onus on health care workers to give special treatment and rights to HIV infected people. Where are these rights for Hep C pts? Hep C is an STD that's incurable. Why do we not have a question like the one mentioned involving Ebola?

Political correctness in medicine is going to far. An average of 40,000 women will die from breast cancer this year. An average of 40,000 men will die of prostate cancer this year. Yet how often do you see light blue ribbons for prostate cancer? Hell you can buy pink notebooks in my colleges bookstore with the money going to breast cancer research. I am still looking for the light blue books with money going to what killed my father.

Maybe we should ask why is breast cancer receiving so much attention especially since it is the second most common form of fatal cancer in woman. Lung cancer is number one. So what about lung cancer? Where is the special I-Pod to buy to help Lung Cancer? I have an idea let's try to find a cure for CANCER! Not just one kind of cancer because some think tank thought it sounded politically correct to choose one cancer over another.

It's time for Medicine as a whole to stop with the PC crap and quit dividing up patients by sex, race or by who they got infected with a deadly disease with.

By the way heart disease is the number one killer, cancer number two, guess what number three is?

Climb down from soap box and waits for hate mail.

[EMTBASIC_911_911]

no dust devil, it just said "when treating an AIDS pt"....But I agree.....I dont care if I piss anyone off, Im going to wear gloves even when grandma has a fever....thats how I was taught and thats how I roll lol

[Dustdevil]

no dust devil, it just said "when treating an AIDS pt"....But I agree.....I dont care if I piss anyone off, Im going to wear gloves even when grandma has a fever....thats how I was taught and thats how I roll lol

Good for you! When they spend days in EMT school talking about the importance of BSI and UNIVERSAL precautions, and then toss in an exception like that with no logical explanation, simple common sense tells you that something isn't kosher. The old caveat "trust nobody" is very well placed in EMS. Everybody is contagious until proven otherwise.