NREMT-P Oral Stations

[JakeEMTP]

In approximately 3 months i will have completed my Paramedic program and will be challenging the NR. The majority of the stations I am not overly concerned with as I feel confident in my abilities. However, the oral stations ( keep it clean! ) are of a bit of concern.

What sort of questions or scenarios do they present or is it a hodge podge, or Cracker Jack box if you will, of anything?

Thanks in advance for any insight.

[FireMedic65]

I took my NR about a month ago. It's still pretty fresh in my head. The oral stations were not that bad. Don't over think things, and especially don't get into too much detail of treatment. They look for general stabaliztion of the patient, and imediate care. Heck, I didn't even give dosages on meds, I just said I would get a specific one. Although I can't really discuss what exactly the stations were, since they are pretty anal about that... and who knows who is on this forum that might be an evaluator.... Just stay calm, think about what you are doing, expecially giving a med you would normally give, but can't due to contra indications, or patients age or weight... good luck!

[JakeEMTP]

Thanks for the info. I assumed it to be along those lines. We have to do oral stations for our Medical Director also before we can function in the county. Repetition is the best teacher I guess 8).

[FireMedic65]

yea it's pretty retarded

[Yummymedic05]

When I took mine they wanted detailed, and you can ask detailed questions also. For example you can ask how many steps went up to the home, down to the basement, etc to determine your plan of action in getting to a patient/getting them out. They wanted everything, meds, doses, procedures. They wanted me to ask all the questions, and give a mock ER radio report. Mine wanted it detailed. I had 2 stations (i think everyone does). And they were both ALS calls (obviosuly) one was a little boy having an asthma attack, and the next was an older man with chest pain, that turned into v-tach with a pulse and had to cardiovert. Just know what you're doing, and I would suggest giving too much info rather than not enough.

[JakeEMTP]

Thanks Yummy! :wink:

[ncmedic309]

Jake:

Where are you taking the test?

[JakeEMTP]

Jake:

Where are you taking the test?

I'm not sure yet. I'm hoping there will be a skills testing site in Greenville by the time I have completed classes. According to the NREMT website, there isn't one listed that I could take as we won't be done by the deadline to apply.

There is a CBT testing site about 2 miles from me in Greenville so that isn't a problem.

[DwayneEMTP]

The oral station is the one everyone stood in the hallways sweating over. There was one 15 yr medic I respected a lot, as he seemed to know EVERYTHING and would break it down, very humbly, for anyone..basic, medic student, didn't matter. He stood outside the room pale and visibly shaken waiting his turn. ( I gave him hell about it later and he told me he has serious issues with "make believe", his mind just doesn't work that way. I believe him) It turned out to be about as challenging as applying a KED.

The seem to want you to ask about the environment simply from the point of view of covering your "additional resouces" concern. Is there a crowd? A bunch of steps? Bariatric patient? I simply asked "Are there any issues to ingress or egress or any reason to believe I will need additional resources?" and that seemed to cover it.

You can get the proctor info off of the NR site. What's allowed and what's not. One thing I found interesting (per a classmate) was that they can deteriorated a patient's condition, but can't take them to a point where you can't recover them. So if they go down a slippery slope...it's a very, very long slope with lots of time to recover.

I also won't mention my scenarios as we're asked not to...but I will tell you they were amazingly straight forward. No tricks, traps or ambiguities.

Take lots of vitals. A trick one of my MD instructors taught me (though I didn't use it...I hate tricks meant to allow me to be lazy or foolish) was "I'd like Person "A" to take a set of vitals, repeat them every 5 minutes or after any interventions and report those findings to me" Supposedly that can CYA in case you forget to take a set at some point.

Mainly, don't stress. If you passed ITLS (or one of it's incarnations) and ACLS, have a handle on treating common respiratory issues...then this will be nothing more than a simple story telling session.

Good luck!

Dwayne

[JakeEMTP]

Greatly appreciated Dwayne.

Thanks for the help.