Books about EMS

[ERDoc]

I decided to reread some books that I had read back in my EMS days, when I was still a premed. I thought it would be interesting to read the books, having a different perspective. I read them first as a young, whackerish, full-of-hope undergrad and wanted to see what they would look like to an experienced, grumpy, old attending. It is definitely interesting to see how things have changed, both in my perception of the events and just in the medicine itself. I'm reading EMT:Beyond the Lights and Sirens by Pat Ivy right now. She's a little too touchy-feely for me but I enjoy reading it. It's funny hearing about things such as terbutaline, bretylium and MAST pants. It makes me feel read old but I realized that she was on the ambulance before many of today's providers were either born or out of diapers. I had a reminiscing talk with an old friend of mine from my VAC a few days ago. In NYS, your EMT number is a six digit number and they are assigned consecutively. When I got my first card back in 1992, my numbers were 1713XX. I hear they are up to around 410000. Talk about feeling old, lol.

[island emt]

my original license # back in 1973 was a 3 digit: 873.

They are now into the 400,000 range last I knew.

We met Pat Ivey about 15 years ago at a conference. Great speaker and motivator.

[ERDoc]

I checked out the website for the agency she belonged to and there was no mention of her or the book. It's a pretty popular book in the EMS community (at least it seems), you'd think they would acknowledge her or the book. Just my opinion.

[Kiwiology]

Don't read the books, don't watch the TV shows ... nor do I have a hospital crash cart in my car and never have I shopped at Galls.

Man I am just no fun huh?

Oh, and MAST pants and terbutilyne aren't so bad, there was a time when if you were having other than a cardiac emergency and the Paramedics came they just looked at you and went "um .... yeah".

Hopefully Emergentologist's crushing medical school debt has driven the enthusiasm out of him ....

[J306]

I really liked the book Enroute by Kelly 'Steven' Grayson. He's a really good story teller and doesn't selectively share the stories that just make him look good. Just finished the book 'Cheating Death' by Dr. Sanjay Gupta and currently working on one called 'The Night Shift.'

[ERDoc]

If you haven't ordered at least one thing from Galls, then we can't be friends. I did a quick search about Pat Ivey and apparently her son, David, who she talks about in the books took his own life a few years after the second book was written.

[Caduceus]

I read a good one. Dial 911 by Joan E. Loyd and some other guy. . .it was kinda old so yeah like ERDoc said with the MAST pants etc. . .but it was good.

[ERDoc]

They wrote one or two other books also. Thanks for the old comment. The stories they right about happened when I started EMS.

[Just Plain Ruff]

Thanks for the old comment.

If the shoe fits, might as well throw it!

[ERDoc]

Bite me, Mike.