FireMedicChick164 Posted March 10, 2012 Posted March 10, 2012 I have been in EMS for 12 years now and have finally landed a job that I love. I work in onsite construction site medicine and it's great. For years I worked private EMS on a bus and ended up hating it for a number of reasons so I quit. I have always wondered about people in other parts of the country/world who have jobs in the EMS field. What do you guys like and dislike about you job?
runswithneedles Posted March 11, 2012 Posted March 11, 2012 1. Im able to see new places sinces we are going on 100 mile+ plus transfers regularly 2. Im gaining valuable box time which will put me one step ahead of the rest of the paramedic students in my class who arent working EMS 3. Since my boss is a hardcore hispanic woman.(very tradiitonal) The office is very family oriented. So if I have to call in because of family reasons my boss completely understands 4. As a Paramedic student I am able to work with patients with complex medical histories and medication lists and research the effects, actions, dosages, and reasons they are prescribed. Especially with cardiac meds and EKG's. Their is a real difference between the strips in my text book an the ones in the field. And it has helped me massively with the cardiac portion of my class 5.Its better than flipping burgers for min wage as a college kid. And having this job at my age makes me feel like Im making a meaningful contribution for my age911 As far as the dislikes. Its not 911. Its long and tedious work with no glory and showers of admiring women *cough* 911/fire (with even less thank yous than 911) And other comments I wont post.
nypamedic43 Posted March 11, 2012 Posted March 11, 2012 I dislike the mother may I mentality that pervades the EMS systems in this country. I dislike QA/QI but I have grown immensely because of it, in terms of documentation and patient care. I dislike having to deal with higher level providers (nurses in particular) that look at me like I am thier personal transport bitch and I dont deserve a report as to why I am taking thier resident to the ER or even the respect to come into the room to make sure we have delivered the right patient to the right facility, at the nursing home. I like the fact that I can help people. At this point in my carreer the cons outwiegh the pros.
DwayneEMTP Posted March 12, 2012 Posted March 12, 2012 (So, Ter, I'm guessing when I said, "Don't let that call get to you" that it didn't take... :-) ) I love being challenged. And I love being part of the brotherhood that exists throughout those truly committed to emergency medicine in all of it's forms. I admit to sometimes liking the fact that I get way more credit than I deserve for doing the job that I do. The respect feels great, trying to figure out how to be deserving an impossible challenge. I truly hate the hero bullshit that comes with being a paramedic. Not only when it's bestowed undeserving, but even much more watching others take credit where none is deserved. I love being in the middle of nowhere with no immediate help available. The extra levels of concern and mental grinding that that evokes. I love that I get to/have to think emergent with a constant mix of 'the next few days' thrown in when I'm really not smart enough, or strong enough, or experienced enough to do either well. I then Love, Love, when everything turns out the way I expected despite my deficiencies. I hate being 36hrs from flying home at the end of a 7 week jag without an itinerary because the 9-5ers don't think it's a big deal when or how I get home as long as it happens 'some time within the next 10 days.' But easily my favorite part is being gifted with the friendship of those (of all levels, basic to docs) that believe that they love me by challenging me, that they respect me by making me prove myself, that they work to quell my fears by making me smart enough and strong enough to tackle issues that should be beyond me. Knowing that no matter how stupid I am, nor how bad I screw up, no matter how lost I get, that there are many just waiting to help me find my way as long as I make sure that my medic spirit morally/ethically/emotionally remains intact. A bunch of mushy bullshit, right? :-) Welcome to travel time countdown!! Introspection is kind of part of the process... 4
WolfmanHarris Posted March 12, 2012 Posted March 12, 2012 I love the people I work with. I've had lots of different jobs before this, both great and bad, but the level at which staff support each other every day is the thing I love most about my job. If I have a bad shift, it's my partner and my platoon mates which make me get up and do it all over again the next day. And right now while I'm off work with family issues, the huge support I've had only reinforces that. I love the stability. I have good pay, good benefits and job security that ensures my family is taken care of. With all the other reasons why I love this job, I still wouldn't do it if I couldn't support my family comfortably. The intellectual challenge. Even sub-acute calls have so much to engage the mind. There's always something else to learn. When I talk about the excitement of this job, it refers to that challenge. I love the people we treat. Not all of them by any means, but there are so many interesting people out there with such different background, lives and stories. I've always been attracted to public service careers. I have a certain sense of duty to my community and enjoy serving it. I am entirely aware of how cheesy that sounds, but it's true. I like the shift rotation. Sure 12 hours can be long and nights aren't great, but the four day weekends and six days off each month are a good balance for home life. I like not having to think about what to wear to work? I hate my commute. To work for the fantastic, progressive, growing service I do and live in the great city with affordable housing I do, I have to drive 80 minutes each way to work. I hate standby's. We're station based but move around to other stations to cover. We can spend a huge chunk of our shift doing the stand-by shuffle which really wears me down. I hate doing non-emerg transfers. We don't do a lot of them, but they always seem to come just as you're getting some down time after getting slammed. It also doesn't help that policy hasn't caught up to deployment and only PCP (BLS) crews are supposed to do out of town transfers; except there's only two PCP trucks in my district now, so we get slammed with the 3am 4 hour round trips. I hate BS calls. Not calls where someone is scared, or doesn't know better, or doesn't know about more appropriate resources, but flat out abuse and entitlement. I hate pediatric calls. Of all the calls we do, I feel the most ill-equipped and overwhelmed. I know lots of people do too, but I still hate them. Love kids, hate kid calls. 1
runswithneedles Posted March 12, 2012 Posted March 12, 2012 (edited) I dislike having to deal with higher level providers (nurses in particular) that look at me like I am thier personal transport bitch and I dont deserve a report as to why I am taking thier resident to the ER or even the respect to come into the room to make sure we have delivered the right patient to the right facility, at the nursing home. Most of the nurses know me here because of my paramedic clinicals and are happy to see me. But the ocassional one that gets my goat get to play jump through the miles of paperwork hoops and battery of pt related questions for me to take them. Have any of you guys consider food as being a plus in ems. All the time we are traveling to new places whether across the city, state, country, or world. Heck just yesterday took a guy to austin and on the way back we stopped to eat at a world renowned barbq joint. And i just about died and went to heaven. Edited March 12, 2012 by runswithneedles
Eydawn Posted March 12, 2012 Posted March 12, 2012 I don't get the nurse vs. paramedic thing, I really don't. I've had to fight (hard) for the EMS side of things and bring perspective in my nursing classes... the sad part is, a lot of my instructors just plain don't understand what EMS really does. And they don't care to, in some cases, either. How similar our jobs, in many ways, but how different the viewpoint... if only EMS could start to understand the continuing care part of things, and nursing could see that really what EMS does is fast triage/treat, focusing on immediate stabilization... alas, I wish for a perfect world, haha. I would comment on the original topic, but my current gig-for-hire is long term care night shift... so not really EMS related. My not-paid-EMS-related-gig is Search and Rescue, and what I love about that is the challenge of managing patients over several hours, sometimes in remote settings. I actually really dig interfacing with our local EMS crews; I often end up being the one on scene who does a lot to try to make things run smoothly as far as interfacing with the crews goes. I also really dig the public education side of things... "Hey kiddies! What do you do when you get lost?" What I hate about SAR is recovering dead bodies outta the boonies, especially suicides. And there's always politics... but where is there not? I also hate not being able to respond as much as I'd like to (hence the scheduled public ed side of things). Oh yeah! And everyone's got that one (or two) coworker who thinks they're God's gift to XYZ, right? Man, I got one of those. *sighs* Could do without that one... Wendy CO EMT-B
runswithneedles Posted March 12, 2012 Posted March 12, 2012 (edited) I don't get the nurse vs. paramedic thing, I really don't. I've had to fight (hard) for the EMS side of things and bring perspective in my nursing classes... the sad part is, a lot of my instructors just plain don't understand what EMS really does. And they don't care to, in some cases, either. How similar our jobs, in many ways, but how different the viewpoint... if only EMS could start to understand the continuing care part of things, and nursing could see that really what EMS does is fast triage/treat, focusing on immediate stabilization... alas, I wish for a perfect world, haha. I would comment on the original topic, but my current gig-for-hire is long term care night shift... so not really EMS related. My not-paid-EMS-related-gig is Search and Rescue, and what I love about that is the challenge of managing patients over several hours, sometimes in remote settings. I actually really dig interfacing with our local EMS crews; I often end up being the one on scene who does a lot to try to make things run smoothly as far as interfacing with the crews goes. I also really dig the public education side of things... "Hey kiddies! What do you do when you get lost?" What I hate about SAR is recovering dead bodies outta the boonies, especially suicides. And there's always politics... but where is there not? I also hate not being able to respond as much as I'd like to (hence the scheduled public ed side of things). Oh yeah! And everyone's got that one (or two) coworker who thinks they're God's gift to XYZ, right? Man, I got one of those. *sighs* Could do without that one... Wendy CO EMT-B Nurses: Boast about getting paid more for the same length of time in school (two years for RN program) Because they get paid better they feel special Medics: think they are hot shit because they start an IV and not have a MD consistently breathing down their neck As a medic student who has worked with EMTP/RN's its our understanding that the paramedic knows more stuff as a whole. However the nurse has more in depth knowledge about her stuff. I Nurses-They think about what will get them out of the hospital with the least amount of deficiencies and maintaining quality of life. Paramedics- Think about how am I going to keep this patient alive long enough for us to get there and what can I do to improve his current condition Edited March 12, 2012 by runswithneedles
DFIB Posted March 12, 2012 Posted March 12, 2012 I do not like to have to observe human suffering. I greatly enjoy that I have the opportunity to ease patient's suffering.
MetalMedic Posted March 29, 2012 Posted March 29, 2012 I dislike: -The politics -Jr. High Mentality -SNF Staff not having a clue and treating us like we're being a pain when we ask for certian information -One hospitals Reg staff who throw a fit when we bring in patients and give us wrong demo sheets -No where to pee after 9 pm in certian posting locations -Patients who feel entitled to something, especially the entitled bariatrics family memebers -Patients to treat us like a taxi service I love: -Knowing I made a difference -Most of the people I work and volunteer with -Most of my transfer pt's -The Fire Department Medics and EMT's -The hours -The pay -The uniforms (save so much time in the am) -Patients families who call or write my super with positive reviews (see first in Likes) -Dealing with children -Getting to pick up special riders (Air Ambulance Team, Doctors)
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