A change in the advance skills

[EMS49393]

Perhaps you don't think your patients are seriously ill because you lack the educational foundation to properly assess and treat those patients. Hum... :-k

Last year I moved back to a big, busy city. For the three years between big, busy cities, I worked rural in Missouri. I got to sit on my ass for several shifts without turning a wheel, except to go to the grocery store or maybe rent a few movies. I had transport times of a little over an hour to the closest hospital at that station. My calls averaged 3 hours, sometimes more depending on how many interventions I performed during the trip. I worked at another station that was 120 miles, one way, to the hospital. Calls averaged 5-6 hours. Again, I'd sit for shifts on end waiting for that one call.

I had another paramedic "assigned" to me at one of my jobs. He went to a crap paramedic class, passed by the skin of his teeth, somehow passed the registry (everyone passes in Memphis), and couldn't find his way around a patient with a map and a flashlight. In the best interest of the patients, he was assigned to me. Imagine an hour long transport and not only do you have no idea what is wrong with your patient, you have no idea how to treat them other than a little O2 and an IV. Imagine having to duck your head up through that little cubby hole to ask the educated provider what you should do. Imagine being so scared on a call, you actually refuse to be a paramedic, and decide it's best if you drive this one.

Most of those patients didn't call unless they were seriously ill. I'd say 95% of my calls in both of those systems were outrageously serious. We're talking about rural people that work and pay bills. They'll wait until they are damn near dead to call an ambulance. We also had a large Amish population, well you can imagine how often they call an ambulance.

Best part about those jobs, I got paid. Don't tell me rural systems deserve volunteers. If anything, those people deserve educated and paid providers. It's a whole lot easier to be a nimrod in a big urban system. You can always blame your short transport for your inability to properly care for a patient. Believe me, I see it every shift I work in the ambulance, and more often then not when I'm working the ER.

[JPINFV]

can push meds but my training there wont help in complete the training for being a emt.

So? At my old research gig I got to run EEGs and at my new one I get to draw blood from mice and play with parasites. That doesn't mean I get or deserve a 50% of EMT-[random assortment of letters] course.

[emt322632]

Yes, we've all had to deal with additional inservices for new protocols and the like. We've all had to deal with additional education that our medical directors have saw fit to bestow upon us.

Perhaps your medical directors feel that your system is inadequate, and they are simply trying to bring it up to snuff. I am sure it is not a personal attack against you, or an attack on your level of care.

As Emergency Medicine advances, so must we in the trenches. You either roll with the punches, or you get dragged kicking and screaming into the new age.

[dahlio]

What does the fact that you run 120 jobs a year have to do with anything? What does it matter that most of them are broken legs, or my belly hurts? Does that mean that people in Idaho don't have MI's, seizures, or serious traumas? So for that one run a year, where an extra 200 hours of education could have saved the guy having an MI is not worth it? Why should you be giving sub-standard care like that? Being volunteer does not exempt you from delivering excellent patient care either. That's what we're here for, the patient, and nothing else.

-dahlio

Just a tip, Many here on this website appreciate constructed paragraphs, as well as good grammar. It's just easier to read, and makes you look more respectable in my opinion.

[jsadin]

This thread brings up an interesting discussion that I had in another forum and also with fellow EMS workers in my area: what kind of call volume should a paramedic see? Can the average medic be a "good" medic in a system that only has 120 calls per year total? I had posed the question because I've had more than one medic tell me no one should be a part-time medic because they wouldn't get the patient contact time needed to remain sharp. If that's the case, where does this leave rural America? Not all of us can be "fortunate" enough to live near medium to high volume systems.

[WendyT]

Robo-medic to the rescue :headbang:

[ERDoc]

I think those 200 hours might be better spent on a composition course. Do you want the ability to push meds with the education or are you against the meds altogether?

[tinman694]

Edukacation sucks....or at least those in Cleveland OH who got the misspelled diplomas said so.

200 hours is like taking basic again! GEEZ!

Last time I totaled up the number of hours I had in a two year period for the recert to National Registry and the state---it came to 400 hours....hmmmm...

(BTW...I also "Volunteer" and work two full time jobs?!)

Stop the griping and learn to use grammar to its (at least readable) ability!

Its not just skills...you have to know what the hell you are doing and why you are doing it!!!

[fire/emt]

I want to thank you for all your comment. for just to clear this up i don't mine the xter hours

and i would like to have the meds when needed. i was just wondering if anyone came across this in the past. and i love being a emt even the one that have a stub toe and need to go to the hosp at 2 am. I love helping people and I take being a emt serious.

[AZCEP]

Increasing demands are part of the job. If you don't mind it, then why are you questioning the need for it?

Is it too much to ask to use proper grammar in your paragraphs? :roll: