A Year in Review, Resolutions, The Suicide and A Look Ahead

Well howdy gang, it has been entirely too long since I have updated Smoke Before Fire. No I haven't abandoned the blog, I have just been entirely too busy. So let's kick it off, my last post of 2010.

Helena


So after living here for a year come August I came up with the amazing revelation that in such a short time I had built a complete life here. Friends, a worthwhile job that I enjoyed and finishing my schooling combined into a nice place to live and thrive. Throw into that equation the fact that my sweetie came back from Japan and we "took the next step" and moved in together it comes as a complete package. As I stated before, an amazing revelation.

A Year in Review


This year has been busy. I've come into my own as an EMT-Basic and have seen some incidents that I still think about. I have even pushed myself further in becoming an ALS provider by getting my endorsements. I admit I am still intimidated by the fact that I can do these procedures but I am slowly becoming comfortable with them.  I have joined a volunteer fire department that I am proud to be apart of. We don't run a lot of calls, roughly 60 a year, but they take firefighting seriously and I am amazed at the amount of experience they bring to the table. All of this as helped push me further into the EMS field and I am thankful for every day I am apart of it.

Resolutions


As the year is coming to an end it's time for New Year's Resolutions... The promises we make to ourselves that seem to fizzle out and something we seem to start to dread every year we make them. Am I going to make a New Years resolution? Yes and no. I am going to work out more, I am going to love more, I am going to enjoy life more, not because I feel that I am obligated to make such resolutions, but more because that's how I want to live my life. So no in the aspect that it isn't a resolution and more of a daily choice. Lame sounding I know, but very true.

My Third Semester


Well I am 75% of the way done with school. This semester didn't end in the 4.0 I had expected but in a 3.5 bringing my accumulative GPA to a 3.8. Everyone chalks it up to my sweetie being back but I chalk it up to being busy. A 3.8 isn't bad in my eyes. So I'll accept it. This semester was a lot more book learning and a lot less hands on which made the semester drag on but I made it through.

The Suicide


About two months ago I wrote about that call. The one that haunts us and at the end of the post I wrote about how I would see more calls that would stick with me. Well about three weeks ago my medic buddy and I were working when we were paged out for an apparent suicide. We got there and came into see a person who had used a gun to commit suicide. Once we saw the gun we backed out and waited for law enforcement.  I'm not going to go into details anymore other than I helped officers with their investigation and then helped transport the person to the morgue in Boulder. The person's kid found them and that is where it hit me. But thanks to my friends and family for being supportive of seeing something so shocking. My heartfelt condolences go out to the family in their loss.

A Look Ahead


So after a busy year I look forward to my final semester in Helena, my final few months here and a new start in Billings with my lady. I look forward to the internship with the local Fire Department and I look forward to a few pleasant surprises and whatever life plans to throw at me. I wish everyone a Happy New Year and hopes that you all get to spend it with the people that make you happiest. Thanks for reading in 2010 and I look forward to seeing you for another edition of Smoke Before Fire in 2011.

Updates!

Hi everyone! It has been an entirely busy few weeks. I battled strep, registered for my final semester of fire and rescue classes, had some 911s, hunkered down for a blizzard and so on. Without wasting time lets jump into it.

My First IV Patients 


Now I know what you're probably thinking. He's already talked about his first IV patient. Well that's true I have,  but that was my first IV patient with people supervising. This was my first patient on my own after the endorsement was applied to my license. A 93 year old lady with dehydration etc. Every IV I tried to do I lost the vein. They would disappear. I was hoping to tell you all of my first successful patient stick but alas, I did not get one on this lady. I could have continued sticking her but rather than treat her like a pin cushion we just got her to the hospital.

Two Sundays back I had to run a trip to Kalispell for an ALS (Advanced Life Support) run. It was an ALS run because the hospital had a bag flowing with Normal Saline (NS). Plus the doctor wanted us to give the patient insulin. Which I didn't mind you because it is out of my scope of practice. But it wasn't bad. Just watched the bag to make sure it was flowing.

Wildland Fire v. Snow/Sleet Storm


Well it is November as you all know which for the state of Montana usually means cold rain storms that turn into sleet then snow. So it was safe to assume that our Wildland fire days for this year were over. Well it just so happened that during a storm like I stated above MCVFD was paged for a wildland fire. We all wore our structure gear and even though there was a combination of rain and snow hitting us, these spot fires had 20-25 foot flame lengths. Pretty amazing for being in a storm. However exciting as it sounded, all it turned out to be was two people with 7 slash piles burning. We waited with a charged hoseline for the fire department whos district it was to come down and tell us what they wanted to do. They were okay with the giant flames and we were cancelled. Lesson learned from this call, Wildland fires can happen all year round, even in cold wet rain/snow storms.

My Battle with Strep


Well about three days before Halloween I was hit with an obnoxious cold/flu thing. Fever, chills, nasty sore throat and so on. Real nasty. Well I expected to be over it in a few days. I wasn't. The sore throat was miserable. So I went to the doctor and my quick strep test was negative. So I thought I was fine, but I got a call the next day and the 24 hour culture test was positive. So after 10 days of sickness and 10 days of anti-biotics I am strep free and feeling awesome. Going back to the gym was rough but I did manage to get back up to speed.

Other than that, not much is going on. As I stated above I registered for my final semester of classes and I really can't wait to be done and off to paramedic school. I don't know why but I have the itch to learn more and more. I blame my sweetie. Always pushing me to be better and stuff. But I'm off for much needed gym time so stay safe and stay tuned!

To The Left...

You all may have noticed a widget to the left of these posts showing the names, faces, fire departments and so on of various firefighters. This widget shows those who have died in the fire service, be it a Line of Duty Death (LODD) or something related. It is important to recognize what others have done in this service and what they have given for the safety of others.

Coming soon to a blog near you:

- My first IV patient
   - Patient's since my IV endorsement
- A wildland fire in the middle of a rain/snow storm.
- My battle with strep throat!

So stay tuned!

That Call...

When I first got into the EMS field I heard stories; stories of close calls that became saves, calls that turned out to be stranger than fiction, and even calls that turned out to be nothing  Every EMT has them. Every EMT loves telling them. However when asked one simple question you get a completely opposite reaction. "What's the worst call you've ever been on?" Most people's face expressions become stoic, the moment they remember the call that continues to haunt their thoughts every so often, the one that still comes to them in their dreams.

It would randomly be brought up from time to time, some able to share that call that got to them, others just dismissing it by changing the subject. Others would blow off their own recollections with suggestions as what was to come for us new EMT folk. Most of the EMS people I talked to were curious as to how I would handle my first truly bad call. I have to be honest I wondered that myself, the thought coming up at least once every time I was paged to a call. Would it cause me to lose sleep like it does most? Would I freeze up being completely useless during the call? Was I cut out to be there in someone else's worst moment?

Well having that call is inevitable. Sooner or later it is going to happen. The best I can do is do what I have been trained to and do it to the best of my abilities. So I was told, and what I told myself.

Well I was hoping to finish this rambling with a quip about me still having yet to experience this call and how I think I can handle it. The truth is, Last Friday night, October 22nd I experienced that call. ATV crash with a patient who was DOA. I won't go into details on it as I would rather not like to think about it, but forever will the patient's face, body, everything be burned into my mind, forever will the screams of hysteria and the patient's significant other clutching me haunt my thoughts. I did my job and did what I was supposed to, but I didn't sleep the rest of that night. I'm still waking up every so often with my mind going to that night. Yeah these calls will become easier in time and yeah I am going to see a lot of these calls in my career.

I've been told that I need to not take my work home with me, and I am getting a stronger stomach in taking these calls but having people tell me that I will get to a point where they won't affect me at all. In all honesty I'm hoping I never reach that point. I have to learn to not let these calls take a hold of my life and strangle it and I need to learn to accept that call for what it is and move in but it won't. That call, my first bad call, will forever be with me. I hope to learn to let it not affect me so deeply but to not let it affect me at all in my opinion causes us to lose the very thing that made us want to lose sleep in the first place, to see people at their worst and help them. Without that empathy, without that sense of what those people are feeling and a longing to make that go away we become complacent. We lose our urge to do our best and we lose a chance to make a difference.

I end on the fact that I will probably continue to lose sleep thanks to my career choice and what I have/will see. I am learning how to handle these calls. Most importantly I am learning how to be empathetic without letting these calls eat me from the inside. It will take time, it will take struggle, but in the end, that's what makes it worth it.

Facing Your Fears... Or Those Things That Make You Question Your Sanity

Hello everyone. Here it is, another blog post. I know, I know, it has been a bit since my past post. Well I have been busy. Cranking out three tests a week, volunteering at more than one place and work just seems to fill up my entire life. So here we go.

For our Rescue class I believe I mentioned the fact that I was going to be going repelling off of a 200ft cliff face. Well I did and it was a hoot. Moving on. Ha not really here we are. We go up to an area called Blue Cloud which for those of you who don't know where that is, it is by Baxendale Fire Department on the way to Missoula. The road was bumpy and it took some off-roading to get to, plus a half mile hike up the mountain and there you are. We had a stokes basket with 300lbs worth of gear to carry up too. Needless to say we got a workout before we even hit the actual cliff face. Once we got up there two facts were quite evident. One, the view was amazing, two, the view was amazing because we were really high up. The second fact playing a lot into what I am about to write.

We set up all our stuff and got it ready so that we could repel down the cliff face. Anchoring to a tree, getting our helmets and harnesses on, and strapping in. So we went one at a time and I spent most of the day taking pictures for the programs Fire and Rescue Facebook page. I was second to go over the cliff face. So I get strapped in and after triple checking my harness and rope I start making towards the point of no return. I get there. Staring down I see our belay guy staring up at me. Two thoughts are going through my mind, man are we high up, and this really gorgeous view isn't going to mean anything if this rope snaps. Words of encouragement are shouted, prayers to the powers that be are muttered and look out below. I was scared out of my mind but I proceeded cautiously. You know that feeling of panic you get when you're doing something that causes the voice in the back of your head to shout "WHAT THE HECK HAVE YOU BEEN SMOKING!?", the same feeling you get when you look at that first downward path of a rollercoaster? Well yeah that feeling was very much present. I very cautiously started leaning myself back until my legs were perpendicular to the rock face. The only thing between me and a very fast approaching ground being the grip of my left hand on the rope. I found that as I inched further down the feeling of dread went away and as I got more comfortable The repel came quicker and more comfortable. Once I hit the ground and shouted "Belay off!" I looked up. The wall had been conquered. My sanity had been questioned. My heart was still racing.

We spent a few more hours repelling and getting over our immediate fears of height. As the day progressed so did  the wind and we decided to call it a day.

Unrelated Notes


On an unrelated note or two, my sweetie passed her first responder practicals. All she has left between her and her license is the National Registry test but as we all know she will pass with flying colors. We volunteered at the Boulder Rodeo and there were no injuries short of the minor breaks and usual dislocations.

Other than that, that's about it. So stay tuned. I'd make a mention of promises to update this more frequently but who knows when. So stay tuned. There will be updates. Sometime in the near future.

Coming Soon to a Blog Near You!

Stay tuned for a new blog post tomorrow, complete with pictures!

School Part One

Well hello everyone, it sure has been a while since I've updated this blog. I haven't forgotten nor have I abandoned it. School has been ridiculously busy. I've had a bunch of tests already and we are only a month into school. Here is a break down of each class.

Math - The first two months will be review, starting from 4th grade math to basic algebra. The math is so simple it's hard. What I mean by this is that I do it so much in my head that actually taking the time to write out the step by step arithmetic I make simple mistakes.

Rescue - This class is probably the most fun class I've had. Right now we are learning how to do low angle rescue with 3:1 pulley systems  and repelling. We use these to go down hills lower than 30 degrees. We will be learning high angle but that will be coming later. We are tomorrow (09-18-2010) going out and doing live scenarios so expect a post about that with pictures.

Fire Inspection - So far a lot of book reading in this class with lectures. We are going to actually go out today and do mock fire inspections. I'll write more on that later, but we are going over the basics of fire inspection with an advanced class down the road.

Building Construction - We are learning various building techniques and construction methods used to build all sorts of occupancies. The basis of this class is to teach us what to look for in the new light weight construction that can kill us firefighters.

Fire Suppression & Detection Systems - We learn about different types of alarms for fires and the systems used to extinguish them. A lot of book learning to this class.

FIRE & EMS

We have had a few calls since I've written last. One was a structure fire with a CO count in the 600+ parts per million. As defined by OSHA, anything about 500 ppm, is something we shouldn't be in. In 2 minutes or so you die. Paper and yarn on a 100w bulb was the culprit of this fire.

We have had a few rollovers but everyone was fine and walked away. That is a good thing but still no chance to get my last two patient sticks for my IV endorsement. However I did just recently get hired on by Boulder Ambulance so I will probably have my endorsements here shortly.

Other than that, I'm spending my time working and going to school. Trying to get ahead in all of it. My sweetie has her interview to get into PA school so I'm wishing her a whole lot of luck. Stay tuned!

The Way I Look at Life

Busy with school, and work, I will write on that here this next week, when I have time, but I was going through some old emails and what not and stumbled onto something I wrote a long time ago that kind of is the way I few life. It was written after my twin sister's passing and was inspired by that tragedy. Happy reading.

"They say how one deals with hardship is a definition of this person's character, I say that there is only so much character that any one human being should have to exhibit. When they don't realize their potential, they are deemed as a waste of time, discarded, thrown away like any common piece of trash. There are some that embrace this idea, and then there are some that take this idea and use it to fuel every movement, every action and every thought to rise above it and walk in their own path. Some lose the daily battle that is life, others will find a way to coexist with it, passing by without even a trace and there are those who will make an impact so monumental that it shapes lives. This impact is seldom derived by a single exploding moment but rather through a series of simple actions in the way one lives their life. There within holds the idea that even a small impact could possibly change the way another person views this existence called life, and wouldn't that be better than impacting no one at all? I think this, to change the outlook of even one person based on our actions, our ideas, or even ourselves, is just an opportunity too hard to just pass up..."  

~ Anonymous

IV's and Seattle

Alrighty everyone well I was hoping to keep this updated more but I am having a hard time finding the time to update this blog, but don't worry I will keep it going. You know how summer is. As I have said in earlier posts Summer has finally started and as it is really short, it's hard trying to get everything we want to do this summer done in a few short months. Anyway it has been a busy few weeks in the Fire/EMS world ending with a wedding in Seattle. So let us jump right into it.

EMT-B Endorsements


So this week I finally got the boss' okay to start my endorsements. So rather than just being an EMT-B that can assist patients with their medications I can actually give medications, place IV's and open airways etc. Well I have my monitoring endorsement already. I can place a 4-lead, monitor heart beats, check blood glucose and so on. These past few weeks I decided that I was going to just work on the cognitive parts of these endorsements myself. So I decided I was going to do the IV/IO initiation (starting) and IV/IO maintenance (monitoring) endorsements. Well the Paramedic/Instructor saw me working on these endorsements and decided to take it upon himself to teach me.

So after I got down the cognitive stuff it was time to do the psycho-motor stuff. My buddy from fire class and EMT coworker Dave decided that he was going to be my first IV poke. We were both nervous as hell but the paramedic was watching. Well the first one I totally missed the vein. Not so sucky for me, but a lot more sucky for Dave. Well the second one I nailed as you can see by the pictures. The first one is my IV technique and then my second one is the IV fully finished. After that I went 7 for 8. So that felt pretty good.

By the end of the day I was exhausted with IVs and I had fire training. We went over structure triage and went out and triaged a persons house that was out in the middle of a lot of trees. Beetle kill and all.

For those of you who don't know when I refer to the beetle kill, our winters haven't been cold enough in the past ten years to keep the pine beetle from entering Montana. These beetles burrow into the trees and lay eggs. The next spring the eggs hatch and the larva burrow and feed inward towards the core. Not only does this cause damage to the trees but when the beetles burrow in a deadly tree fungus is brought in, causing the trees to die. I don't know the science behind it but that is what I've heard.

Anyway after that it was time to head to Seattle for a wedding. The wedding was beautiful and original. The bride and groom had everyone let go balloons at the end of the wedding. It was awesome. Dinner was delicious and the band was epic. When I say epic I mean they were amazing . They went from singing 60's hits, to rapping eminem and lady gaga to Bon Jovi's Living on a Prayer to end the wedding. Ending on a natural high of good food, good music and good people we all went to my car to find the picture you see here.

Apparently a lady decided that she wanted my sweetie's sister in law's purse and had to shatter my window to get it. After a police report, canceled credit cards and so on, we finally taped it up with cardboard and went back to the hotel. We hung out and played games Saturday night then drove home Sunday. All and all it was a good time and meeting my sweetie's family was fun. They all enjoy each other and having fun and it was neat to be around.

Other than that not much is going on, I hope to get my first patient stick at work tomorrow but we will see. Wish me luck, until next time, stay safe and stay tuned!

KIeffner Ranch, Stupid Kids, and the Fourth of July

Well this past week has been a very eventful week in the Fire & EMS field. We've had a fire, a big one at that, a kid who stole his grandmother's car and rolled it, and the Fire Department Independence Day BBQ. So without further ado here is my week.

The Kleffner Ranch Fire


The Kleffner Ranch is a famous ranch just south of Helena and west of East Helena that was developed in the 1880's and was abandoned in 1893 after The Silver Panic hit and set ruin to the owner. After being vacant for a number of years, Paul Kleffner bought the ranch in 1943 and set to restoring it to it's original beauty. He then sold it in 2005 where it was still being developed into a popular place for weddings, receptions and so on.

As you can see it pretty much is a big deal place in Helena. Everyone knows of it as a landmark. So let's get into it. It was roughly 00:45 (12:45am) and I was laying awake in bed. I don't know if it was the banging of branches and blinds caused by the breezy gusts of wind outside or just a general being awake but there I was, awake. I had just closed my eyes and had just started to nod off when the familar "beep, beep, beep" of the pager went off. After scrambling to put on my fire clothing. I raced off to Station 2. I made it right as the first truck was leaving and got on Tender 1.

We raced like Highway 518 and came around the bend to see an orange glow encompassing most of the area. As we got closer the barn came into sight. An image that will forever be burned into my brain lay before me. Flames shooting out of the roof roughly from what it seemed, about 20 ft high, heavy smoke was showing from all over and flames were jutting out from all the eves. Everyone was scrambling to get their gear on and get all masked up. I was part of the second crew and we ran up with the monitor and started blasting water into the structure. We couldn't get enough water pressure to run the 3inch going into the monitor, while balancing 120psi in the 1 3/4 inch pre-connect. After some juggling and finding a stable water source we were in business. We changed bottles three times before we were sent to rehab. Which we were supposed to rehab 10 minutes at least for every bottle of air we were on. I never ran out of air, usually getting down to about 50%.

Finally after being ordered to go to the ambulance and get checked out, get placed on O2 and relaxing a bit, I got bored and jumped back into the thick of it. This picture to the left is of me shooting water into the building to knock out some visible fire. After we did what we could we realized we just weren't going to get the fire from the angle we were out, so we called in an excavator and the City of Helena's Aerial Ladder Truck. The next picture is one I took of the Aerial and Excavator with the sun coming up. With this combo we made short work of the fire. Most of us rested and pounded down some BK sandwiches and crappy coffee. But at 5am after fighting fire for four straight hours, coffee is coffee.


At 07:25 after an hour of mop up and attempted salvage, and cleaning up/breaking down the hoses, we were clear of the scene. After almost 7hrs my first structure fire was knocked down. Here is an after shot of the building and a link to the Helena IR News Article.

EMS

Later that morning I had to work, so I was at that point going on 32 hours roughly of being awake. I ended up having to drive from Helena to Great Falls then over to Kalispell and back down. Here is a shot of some angry clouds on the way back. After the fire and getting back from work at about 22:30 (10:30pm) and being up four about 42 straight hours I managed to get some sleep.

Friday night I worked with Mike the Medic and we had a pretty quiet night until about 01:20hrs or so. A kid (15yrs old) decided that he needed to steal his grandmother's car and drive it to California to help a friend. Around the Seiben area was when the Highway Patrol started chasing him, and it wasn't until Boulder Pass that he hit the guard rail going 110mph. When we got there he was cuffed as he had a standoff with police. He was laying on the ground in cuffs with a sheriff's deputy holding c-spine. We boarded him and got him to the hospital. From what we could see he only had seat-belt bruises. Luckily.

Independence Day


The fourth of July was done in a typical fashion. BBQ's, Fireworks, beer, etc. The fire department had its annual BBQ. We had really good food. We sat around a fire as it was cold. Yeah, like 40's in the evening. Folks shot clay pigeons. Then we busted out the fireworks. As you can see by the picture.
But that is about it. My first really big structure fire. Stupid kids thinking they are invincible, and good food amongst fun people. Can't ask for anything more I guess. Stay tuned as the fire season looks to get into full swing!

The Para-God Complex: A Return to the Basics

I have been a nationally registered EMT-Basic for a year and a half now and a licensed and practicing EMT since January. Needless to say I am not the most experienced EMT in the world but I am learning a lot. Over the past six months I have worked with a number of ALS and ACLS providers, ranging from a fully endorsed basic to a paramedic. Each one has given me a different perspective. Also in my six months working for Eagle I have run into many other health care providers in the various hospitals I've seen. Now a lot of the providers are awesome, care about the patients enough to listen to a patient report and there are those that feel inconvenienced by patients. This ranges from EMS providers to doctors.

To be fair I have worked with my fair share of folk from both of these categories. I've seen good EMTs and medics who care more in making the patient the most comfortable they can be. I've also seen those EMTs who just want to get the patient dropped off and get back to the barn. I've run into Medics who are nothing but friendly and are willing to take the time to teach us basics various tricks of the trade and I've seen some that don't even give you the time of day. It's the latter I will be focusing on for the rest of this post. Here's an example:

One night my partner and I were coming in from a 911 to a nursing home. The patient was in no means critical but in distress nonetheless. We called a patient report in to a very annoyed nurse. Apparently calls at 0300hrs just do not make anyone's morning. We get to the hospital, get the patient moved over to the hospital bed and while my partner is giving his report as he was the one who did patient care, I went to remake the cot and clean up the rig. Well I got all the sheets together saw one of the hospital paramedics walking towards me. I asked him if he would help me lift the cot as it was lowered and he just ignored me and walked by. Now he may not have heard me but ask anyone that knows me, they will tell you I am not a quiet guy and he was two feet away from me when the question was asked. I asked my partner what his deal was as my partner also works as a medic for the hospital and he explained that this particular medic felt that cot making was beneath him. He finished by telling me that this medic was a prime example of the Para-god complex: a feeling of being above people because he knows how to push drugs, knows more advanced life saving techniques and can generally do a lot more than basics can. This would not be my first run-in with this complex. Other examples include being dumped with stable patients that the hospital medics don't want to transport.

Now I understand that with all this knowledge paramedics have a lot more responsibilities with trying to save a patient and that this can go to one's head. Especially if they were to have a streak of saves in the back of an ambulance. However as one of my fire instructors taught me, they can push all the drugs they want but if they don't start with the basics, the stuff an EMT-B is fluent in, no amount of drugs pushed will help a patient. The basics include opening the airway, checking and remedying patient breathing problems, and finally checking for adequate circulation. Without these there is no point in pushing drugs on a patient. The point is, that even with all the medical training in the world at your disposal not forgetting the basics is paramount for a patient's survival.

This does not mean that I won't be going for my paramedic certification. I plan on going for it as soon as I am done with fire school. What it does mean is that feeling that certain calls, or certain duties are beneath you causes not only a disservice to your patient base but also causes you to be complacent in patient care. This complacency will cause anyone to forget the basics needed to be done in every call. Maybe not all the time, but some of the time, which is many times too many in my opinion. Remembering that we all once started out as basics, unless someone skipped that step and went straight to medic school, and remembering we were all at the bottom of the totem pole will create more humble health care providers who don't mind teaching those below us the tricks of the trade. This in turn creates a chain reaction that will snowball lower and lower creating EMS providers who are focused on the most important part of patient care. The well-being and betterment of their patient.

Blog Spring Cleaning, Long Trips, Fire Muster!

Howdy all! Well as you can see there have been some changes made to Smoke Before Fire. What can I say other than that I was really bored with the look that Smoke Before Fire had. Then I discovered the new Template Designer by Google and as you can see, my blog got hot! Literally! Then my title image Just didn't fit the template and the sizing was off, so a new title image! So yeah, blog spring cleaning has come and I like the results. I mean I don't see it much because I don't read the blog myself, because honestly who reads their own blog? But I hope you all like it.

EMS


So work hasn't been too exciting. Thursday I spent 14 hours of my 21 hour shift in an ambulance. I got very familiar with Eagle VII that day. Here's how it went down. I get to work at 1000hrs and am told we have to leave at 1030 for a patient pick up in Butte. We get to Butte to find out that the patient's appointment at the FHVA is the following day. So we went to Butte for no reason. Well we make it back to Montana City and were getting off the interstate when our boss calls us to tell us that we have a patient transfer to Missoula for St. Peters. So we get there, drop the patient off and come back. On the way back we get a call from the VA saying we need to bring a patient to St. Peters from the VA. It was a behavioral patient so I had to do patient care with him as well. Well after we drop the patient off and get back to the shop, my partner Mike gets a call from the VA and we need to go up to Missoula again for another patient. So after maybe sitting and relaxing for 10 minutes we are on the road again. We get the patient and come back and get back to the shop at 12:30am.

Luckily we didn't have any calls that night, and I got to sleep for a few hours before I got up early to call my sweetie who is Stateside bound this Wednesday! Pretty stoked. But afterwards I went home and passed out for another four hours. That next night we didn't have any calls so I was going to go to bed early but our favorite sheriff's deputy came to visit us. So we talked with him for a bit. Again after getting to bed around midnight I woke up early. I didn't get to go back to bed when I got home because I had to get ready for Fire Muster.

Fire Muster


So every year a town about five miles west of Montana City by the name of Clancy holds a series of events known as Clancy Days. Basically it's a weekend of cook outs, flea markets, music, and fun. The Clancy Volunteer Fire Department uses this weekend to host it's Firefighter Competition known as Fire Muster. Basically you have teams of four doing three events.

The Fire hose relay is the first event where you have a hydrant, three lengths of hose and a nozzle. We start behind the hydrant, run to our respected areas of the hose and couple them together. Afterwards we raise our hands and the hydrant guy lets the water flow. We shoot one target, shut the water off, then couple a different nozzle and a different hose length and shoot the second target. The team with the fastest time wins. We had the second fastest time, because the first Clancy team cheated and didn't use gloves. Well they got a second time to go and got a faster time. None of the other teams got a second round. Our time was 53 seconds which wasn't bad. We would have had faster but our first guy didn't tighten the coupling tight enough and it burst. It soaked him and that was hilarious.

The second event was the Fold-A-Tank bucket relay. We had four buckets that we had to use to take water from the fold-a-tank and fill up a oil drum. The first person with the steady stream flowing out won. Well it was a good competition because Jefferson City and Montana City tied. But they gave it to Jefferson City because they were operating with three people instead of four.

The final event was the keg chase. No, we don't have to race against frat boys in hopes of being the first to get a hold of a beer keg. Basically it was a tug-o-war with fire hoses. We have an empty keg strung up on heavy duty cable wire in the air and the point is to use our 1 1/2 inch hose-lines to push the keg towards the other team and cross the line. We were first up against Jefferson City and we had a back and forth but we were able to push it past them. Both Clancy teams faced each other and the winner of that faced us. It was Clancy two. We were deadlocked in the middle for a while before our nozzle-man accidentally turned our nozzle off and we couldn't recover. But again we got second place.

By the end of the competition, our gear was drenched, we were freezing, because we were flowing water from a run-off filled creek, and we were the runners up. We did not receive any trophy but we did show the other departments that we were pretty skilled in what we did. Even when Clancy teams cheated some. So yeah, look out Clancy, next year Montana City is going to smoke you guys!

The Smoke Alarm


We had one call the other night around midnight. It was a smoke alarm going off. Turns out that the gentleman not being able to handle the beeping ripped out his smoke alarm, exposing live wires (another fire hazard) and leaving it at that. Well even after ripping out the alarm the beeping was still going off. After some exploring it was discovered that the alarm was the gentlemans UPS computer back-up system's low power warning. Yeah, a little ridiculous.

But that is about it, I hope to write more soon, but it's going to be a busy next few weeks, what with my sweetie returning home and us going to my buddy's wedding. So stay tuned!

Rain, Rain Here to Stay... Or So it Seems!

So as the title states it's been rainy in Montana. Not a constant rain but the kind of rain that goes away long enough to make you think you can go outside and do things and will sneakily comeback moments later; The kind of rain that cakes your vehicle in mud; The kind of rain that turns into snow then back into rain at a moment's notice. So yes, it is officially spring in Montana. But as we enter into June we will be arriving very shortly into Summer. Montana is the kind of state where the seasons spring and fall do not stay long. You get used to it, enjoying the changing of colors that happen so rapidly. The dismal and constant white, changes to green and beautiful. Then to the brown of summer, with a rapid orange of fall back to the dismal constant white. But yeah it's raining.

It's been an interesting few weeks since I've last posted. I left off before with telling you that I had a fireman's funeral to attend. I won't go into detail, but I will say it was beautiful. They had an honor guard. We were to wear our uniforms, we saluted as the decease passed. The coolest part was the mile and a half parade of ambulances, fire trucks, cop cars, from all of the state coming to pay their respects for a fallen firefighter. These two pictures I have posted show just a fraction of the fire trucks that were in tow. I was in Engine two from MCVFD and we were the second fire truck in line. The most amazing part was the brotherhood of firemen that came to honor this firefighter they didn't even know. We did a military farewell at the Fort Harrison here in Helena and that was it. Afterwards we went up to our station one and had food and just spent time with everyone that knew the firefighter. Laughs were had, tears were shed but overall people just came together to honor one of our fallen. The weather was just a constant day of rain, which seemed fitting.

That evening I had stopped by my ambulance shop to pick up some stuff I left at work in my haste to go home and get ready for the funeral that morning. Well good thing that I was there because we had a page go out for a MVA (motor vehicle accident) with three patients, one ejected. I wasn't going to go with Eagle but the Fire Department got paged too so I went as a firefighter but did my EMT gig. We get there and the ejected patient was out. Not only out of the car, but unresponsive. So the ALS folk went to deal with her and they put me in charge of the other two patients that were seat belted in. Basically here is what went down. Both patients c-collared, backboarded, placed on O2. Once one of the ALS crew was done with the ejected patient they came in and did their IV thing.

The patients were stoned and hit a 35mph corner going 85mph. They were going so fast they cleared the 5ft high fence ten feet away from the road. Needless to say, they got distance. After we patched them up, got them to the hospital and dropped them off it was time to go home and relax. Well after we got the ambulance put back together. As you can see from the pictures... It was a disaster and these were taken after cleaning up the IV stuff. The rains I mentioned earlier, caused the roads to be muddy, wet and disgusting. But oh well. It can't be sunshiny and awesome all the time.

Speaking of doing IV stuff, sometime this month I will be starting the classes for the rest of my endorsements. Which I am pretty excited for. Out of all the people hired in February from our class (5) I'm the only one so far they have felt has stepped up to the plate and proven that they are ready to learn the endorsements. Not to toot my own horn, but it was definitely a yay me moment. So when I get those started I will write here on everything I'm doing.

That's about it in terms of EMS/Fire happenings. I'm working as much as I can preparing for my sweetie to come back from Japan and for us to go on our trip south to Bozeman for a wedding. I will be posting here more on a few things I've noticed in the EMS field. So stay tuned!

So This is What Vacation Is...

Welcome ladies and gentlemen to the first summer post of 2010. Well the first post of summer vacation. It's not summer. In fact, as of today it's still late winter with the damp wet snows that Montana springs are so famous for. I would be surprised but honestly, I've seen it snow on my birthday, in August, late August, before. So no I am not surprised. It's been a busy few weeks to say the least. First I rocked this semester with a 4.0 again so I am sitting with a 4.0 for the year. It's a nice accomplishment considering the last time I rocked a 4.0 was a 6th grade. Not that I didn't do well in school after that, but being a teenage boy my focus was more on chasing girls and causing trouble. Mostly the first one. Anyway, having a 4.0 is nice. It's amazing to finally find something that I love and keeps my interest career wise.

Now it's time for summer. What is this? These random long periods of time where I don't have a paper to worry about, or training to do? These moments where I sit here and do nothing. Free time you say? I remember hearing something about that last August. So that is what this is, free time... Interesting concept. Actually I won't lie, it is nice to be able to just breathe a little bit. Something people close to me seem to tell me all the time. Just breathe Jack, just breathe. Yeah... It's nice.

So with this new found free time I am constantly finding myself looking for stuff to do. I've started looking over my EMT stuff again. The paramedic at my work is thinking of putting on a paramedic class and asked me to be apart of it. I've been back and forth on it, mostly because it's going to be a lot of information and it was three grand to do. Well a rumor has it that it might be a lot cheaper, half the initial price. So yeah there is a good chance that if it pans out like that I will definitely be talking the class. I think. I'm still on the fence. If I can juggle the rest of school, having a life, work and this class I will take it. If not I will wait until I am done with the degree I am working on now. I won't know for sure until I have all the information.

Speaking of work it's been an exhausting few days. During the school year I would work 60 hours a week and during my school vacation I was only scheduled for 30. Ridiculous eh? I would agree. However the new paramedic we hired, also named Mike started making the schedule and gave me 40 hours a week. I think the higher up folk that work there telling him to do so had something to do with that too. Which is nice. I enjoy full time. Well as I have said the past three days I have worked I have spent 25 out of the last 28 hours in an ambulance. I've been to Missoula twice, Deer Lodge, Whitehall/Cardwell, and Kalispell. Which is fine because it's all been Fort Harrison VA time. So it's federal time and after 12 hours on VA time, it's VA overtime which I have 13 hours of.

The fire department has been busy too. I went on my first wild land fire. So picture this. I'm in the bathroom giving myself a haircut. I'm about half way to two thirds of the way done when my pager goes off for a campfire gone astray that is now burning a 20' x 20' piece of land. Well here I am, clippers in one hand, pager in the other. What do I do? Well I raced through the rest of that hair cut and raced to the fire department. I was able to come back and clean up what I missed after don't worry. Anyway, I managed to get to the station as one of the engines was pulling out. But we took my Bravada there because it was faster. Two things  I learned that day driving. One my car hates dirt roads, two, it can still handle the heck out of them.

We get there and the scene was amazing. 8 ft flames racing towards the pine beetle devastated blanket of orange that is the dead pines 15 feet away. Well we throw the water/foam combination on the flames and snuff it out. The rest is mop up work. Chipping away at smoldering logs and blasting it with the hose. What was left of the tent near the campfire? A tent spike melted in half and a cot frame. The irony was that the people who were hired to make sure the place was safer from wild fires were the ones that left the camp fire unattended. We then joked around with some of the DNRC staff and went to the station for rehab. This consisted of filling tenders. Then as I have said before, I wen't to finish my haircut.

There is something to be said about being able to run off, fight a fire, and come home after doing a job well done. It's nice.

That weekend we worked on tender 2. Scraping bed liner out of the tank because water had gotten under it and was causing it to mold. Not the most fun but taking pride in my department was cool. We had training this past week. It was wild land also. We learned how to assemble fold-a-tanks and drafting water. The pictures you see are dropping water from Tender 1 and me rocking the super banana fire suit. I spent most of that night driving Tender 1 as you see in the third picture. It's old and the air brakes are touchy. By touchy I mean that if you want to use them, rather than pressing slowly to slow into braking you have to tap them hard enough to slow you down without going through the windshield. That was itself a pain to master but I'm getting it. Also with being old, the tender only had a hand primer. Being the only young strapping gentleman in the group, that was my job. Get the air out of the line. We filled up the tank and went back to the station.

That's about it this for these past two weeks since school has been let out. We have a fireman's funeral precession we have to do on Monday. A friend, coworker and fire department member lost his wife to cancer. She was also a member of the department. While I am excited to experience what is a very honoring tradition of the fire service, I am sad for his loss.

I will write on that experience this week. Nothing in detail of the funeral itself out of respect for my friend and his family but just my thoughts on it. So stay tuned for that.

My First Year

Well holy crap. I'm done for a bit. That's right, I made it a whole year. I wen't to 99.98% of my classes. I think I only missed three days? Either way it was very few. I've made the deans list. I've fought fire. I traveled to my first foreign country that isn't Canada. I held on to someone very dear to me with 6000+ miles of distance and 15 hours of time between us. I've made friends, I'm sure I've made a few enemies. I have an EMT job, I am a volunteer firefighter. I've had my ups, a lot of ups, I've had my downs, a few downs. So yeah, a year that I didn't know what was in store for me, turned out to be a very positive one. I'm hoping next year will be the same, but all I can do is take it one day at a time. I remember moving up here to Helena last August. What the hell was I doing ran through my head. Turn around, get the hell out. That's all I thought. Then I bit the bullet and now I'm here. I've learned a lot this year. I have a lot more to learn I am sure. But yeah that's it in a nutshell for this year. Now for current events.

As you know school is done and it is time for summer vacation. The last week of school had it's moments. Honestly this semester really didn't feel like I was in school. What with all the time we had off and teachers cancelling class and what not. However Wednesday of last week was amazing. I fought my first fire. It was a training exercise but until you feel the heat of the fire and see it rolling you just don't know. We were at the ARFF trainer. Basically it's a huge plane that they can light up anywhere. As we haven't had the ARFF class yet we treated it as a trailer fire. The cockpit was a bedroom, the seating area was the living room.The bathroom was well... the bathroom. So we got in there and sprayed the hell out of the bedroom. The instructor yelled at me to get in there. So I was a foot and a half away from the fire. By the time we finished that room and got into the main area. The flames were basically what you see in the movies. Rolling up the walls, and hitting the ceiling and rolling up across the ceiling. Then the heat hit me. You know that feeling you get when your clothing gets really hot after being right next to a camp fire and it barely touches the skin? It was like that, but a little less intense. 700 degrees though. Toastie.

After that I went to work and it was lame, a chica I work with was being dramatic. Nothing new. Wednesday after work I ended up getting my gear with the volunteer department. After we got our turnouts, then our wildland gear, our uniforms, and our pagers the guy issuing the gear told us it was about 5000 dollars worth of gear. Yeah I am now in possession of stuff that is worth more than what I make in about 5-6 months.Crazy, But other than that I think I'm in the right place. Saturday I got my first pager call. 15 gallon diesel spill. Yeah nothing too exciting but my response time was excellent. I was the only one there and then they cancelled the page. So as I was leaving I called a fire dept guy and he was like well I'm going to come fill out a report so if you want to see how that is done then come back to the station. So I did then the chief called and told us to respond. So we went over there. Placed dirt and absorbent on the spill then got a report. Like I said nothing exciting but still.

Other than that not much exciting is going on. Fully getting into the swing of Summer vacation. Stay tuned as I get more calls fire and EMS wise!

Busy Busy Busy

So yeah every time I go to write this blog I somehow get distracted. It seems that 40 hours of work a week, plus 19 credits of school keep me busy enough that time escapes me. Seriously, wasn't it spring break like last week? But now that we get down to it we have 14 days of school left. It has been a very busy few weeks. Here's the scoop.

Classes are going well. Driving class has been by far the most fun. We've spent a few days driving on the interstate and in town driving. But the most fun came last weekend when we learned how to operate the engine water pump and aerial ladder. It ended in us using the 1.5" pre-connects to wash the aerial truck and having a water fight. Yeah it's been 70's in Montana and beautiful. I spent some time outside today. The driving instructor has kind of zeroed me out to get things done which is both good and bad. Good because it means I am doing well, bad because it means I'm on his radar. So yeah we have a presentation to work on for driving and that's it. Strategies and Tactics has been productive. We've run a bunch of scenarios and Monday we practiced flat roof venting. Chainsaws, pike poles, and ladders oh my. Tell you what, 70 degree weather on a black roof midday is a bit toasty. PT is going well for the most part. Basic working out and doing my own thing. As I have said 14 days of school left. I'm okay with that. I'm ready for summer.

Speaking of being ready for summer, we are starting to pick up in calls EMT wise. The other night I had my first real trauma call. Car vs. Elk. The car was a ford festiva type car. It rolled a few times, everyone is thinking 4. Anyway I was inside the car holding c-spine and trying to move the patient on the backboard when my boss came up and started cutting the patients clothes. A.) he was in a roll over, bleeding pretty good and probably had shock, B.) I didn't find this out until I was in the car already, the car was leaking gas and starting to smoke. Did I worry a little, yeah. C.) The patient was shivering and showing signs of hypothermia.  We finally got the patient out and backboarded and in the ambulance. We went code to the hospital after bandaging and placing an IV because the patient was losing feeling in his left side. We got the patient to the hospital and checked out. He from what we gathered had a possible broken shoulder, neck and knee, and bleeding somewhere. That's all I know on that patient. We did bring a patient in later that morning and my previous patient was still backboarded. Scary.

The next day, yesterday, we ended up going on a 911 to a nursing home for a man with difficulty breathing. He had a stroke previously and was feeling dizzy. We hooked him up with a 3-lead heart monitor and he was throwing up random beats and problems so we got him into the ambulance. After that it was fluid like in how we operated. My boss was the main EMT on the call and I was his assist, I was hooking up the IV bag and getting it spiked and ready to go along with the blood draw kit ready. Well the IV wasn't pushing fluid and we didn't know why. My boss thought it was because he blew a vein or the iv stick closed off somehow. Well after fiddling with the iv for a bit he gave up and went to give a patient report to the hospital and I was sitting there looking at the patients arm and I noticed it was turning purple. I was uh oh, a clot or something then I saw it, the tourniquet. My boss forgot to take it off. After that the IV started flowing. We got the patient into the hospital and I didn't know what happened after that. That's the problem I guess, patient confidentiality stops us from knowing what happened and if the patient made it.

But yeah that is about it with the calls, I'm starting to work more on my endorsements that allow me to do IV's and advanced airway stuff. Then I will be able to do more than I could before on calls. Looking forward to that. But yeah other than that, life is plugging along, it's amazing how fast time goes when you don't have time to sit and think. The next two weeks will be busy, then I will have some time to breathe. We are going to be playing with live fire at the ARFF trainer on May 5th so definitely expect pictures and a blog about that. Until then hopefully I will be able to find time to work on the blog. Stay tuned!

The Stake Out

So my Friday afternoon at work was not too exciting for the most part. Transfered one patient from Fort Harrison to the BSCC retirement center. He was a nice old guy (90 years old) who had all the nurses fawning over him. Seriously, they loved him. Turns out he would bake pies for him as a thank you for taking care of him. After that we went back to the shop where I cooked up the steaks that one of my co-workers brought for us. After finishing said steaks we got a call from dispatch that basically runs down like this:

Friday, April 2nd

1843* - Dispatch calls us via telephone to ask us to respond to a 72 year old female schizophrenia patient who is off her meds.  They told us that they were going to try to convince the patient to come with us to St. Peter's on her own but chances were, that would wouldn't happen easily without a police escort. We were told to wait about 20 minutes before we arrived so that the local sheriff could get there first. Scene safety, it's a must!

1847 - We were called back from dispatch saying to go ahead and take off but to stage out at a different location and wait for the sheriff to call us in.

Around 1900 or so hours - Arrived at the staging area to wait for police. Shortly after the sheriff arrives and tells my partner and I to follow him.

1915 - Arrive on scene. We wait. My partner and I talk to each other for a while and randomly have conversations with the officers that are coming and going in and out of the house.

1925 - Montana Highway Patrol Arrives to help with patient.

1950 - Sheriffs inform us that they cannot find patient in her house and that previously during the day they couldn't find her because she ended up hiding in a bunch of boxes. Apparently this even has been going on all day... My partner suggests dispatching the local fire department to get their thermal imager.

2000 - Sheriff leaves to get his thermal imager and arrives roughly twenty minutes later. After searching they cannot find her.

2100 - We are cleared of the scene by the sheriff as the patient was picked up by a relative earlier that took her somewhere but was not telling officers where.

So yeah that was the last call I did for the night. It wasn't bad and we basically just sat in an ambulance and hung out but I was pretty excited/nervous because this was my first psych patient that needed a police escort. Afterwards I ended up clocking out and going home. Went to bed early because I have a big day of driving the firetruck to Butte. Hooray for driving.

Easter isn't going to be too eventful as I have to work until 0700 tomorrow and start working again at 1900. So yeah, so much for that holiday. I was really hoping for an Easter basket filled with Easter candy but I will probably just have to settle for Cadbury eggs. Ask anyone, they are like crack to me. Anyway, time to get ready for some driving, stay tuned for my adventure in driving the fire truck to Butte.

* - All times down in military time and are approximate.

Great Falls Hoooooooo!

Okay so yesterday was a long day at work. I worked Sunday night 1900 to Monday morning 0700 which luckily in that time frame there were no calls. My partner and I just sat at the shop and watched Family Guy. The next morning after leaving work I had class from 0900 to 1200 then I was to be back at work at 1300. I started in on the weekly checklist for our 911 rig when one of my supervisors Bob told me to stop what I was doing and join him on the trip to Great Falls to drop off a patient who had hip surgery. I didn't know where the place was so Bob made me drive. So I would then remember where we went. There was a lot of road construction through the canyon as well. But for those of you who haven't been to Great Falls, it's a wee bit confusing to get places at first. Especially considering that one of the main roads had road construction happening and with the added benefit of detours the city was even more confusing. But the trip wasn't bad. It was windy and rainy in the canyon but after that it was sunny. The most amazing thing though was that everything is starting to turn green. Spring is here! Well, it's on its way! So that is a plus.

My partner/boss Bob and I discussed how getting emotionally attached to your patients can be both good and bad. It's good in that if you feel emotional towards the patient you will want to help them, well if you feel for the patient. The bad being that if you get too attached to the patient and it doesn't go the way you want it to the emotions could end up eating at you. The I guess proposed solution to such things is to keep at a distance. Bob told me that it comes with time and losing patients. I don't like the latter part of that but I guess it is the business we are in. Basically the way I see it, the more I study and learn the less likely that will happen, even though I know that it's just a matter of time before I experience my first real loss EMT wise.

Now that the mood is set to something bordering depressing it's time to be upbeat. Tomorrow night after my mandatory work meeting I will be going up to Station One to help fill eggs full of Easter candy for the egg hunt  we are putting on this weekend. So that will be fun. But yeah other than that, it's not been too busy with work. and school. It's weird working 40 hours a week and going to school for 19 credits. It seems like a lot and I feel busy but it doesn't feel overwhelming. So that's a plus. Anyway it's time I be off. Stay tuned!

Classes, EMT, Firefighting etc!

So it has been a really busy couple of weeks these past few weeks. It's only now that it's Spring Break that I have time to write this right now. There has been a lot going between the last time I wrote on here and now. Maybe I should start writing more frequently so that I don't have a lot to write down. Well here it goes.

Classes
So the first half of the semester has wound down which means that we had finals and a change into new classes. The semester wound down pretty smoothly with A's in Haz-mat, Wildland Firefighting, Radio Communication, and Emergency Apparatus Maintenance. I am now Haz-mat certified in both the Operations and Awareness Levels so I know enough to help out but not obligate myself into going into the scary dangerous green gases.

We started new classes last week. Fire Strategies and Tactics and Apparatus Driving classes. I'm pretty excited for both of those because we have less class time and more hands on time. Class time is needed mind you but who doesn't love skipping the bookwork and getting dirty.

So Tactics was off to a fast start with our first two quizzes handed out within the first two classes. Nothing exciting as we have to watch movies and read the chapters on it.  But we're off to a good start. Turns out this class will be more of a hands on class and we will hit on everything we did first semester but with the added bonus of learning tactics that affect the overall strategies of the incidents.

Driving class is going well too. This past weekend we did a driving competency course. We had to drive straight through cones and reverse. I managed to hit 8 out of 11 cones on my first run but I was going at 25mph rather than inching along like most folk. But the rest of the test went well. A week from Saturday we will start our driving around town.

The EMT Job


So these past few weeks have been complete chaos. Transfers aside I've had a lot of 911 calls. Usually on the nights I have to spend the night. It's nice because they had beds there and we get to sleep. The only thing is if we get a 911 call in the middle of the night we have to respond. Well conveniently every time I spend the night we seem busy as hell. So here is the break down of the past three calls I've had as they are ones I remember in detail.

Friday March 19th


Friday was a busy night. My first call was a call to Big Sky Community Center for a woman complaining of shortness of breath. It was a pretty straight forward call. We did vitals and helped her onto the cot and drove her to the hospital. About 10:30pm we received a call from the hospital to return the woman back to the retirement center. Turns out she had fluid on the lungs. Well anyway my partner Anna and I decided to hit the hay after getting the 911 rig ready to go. Everything was going along just fine until 2:30am. We got paged out to Boulder for a woman complaining of abdominal pain. Boulder has its own ambulance service but they couldn't muster up a second person to go so we were called out.

We were called by our boss to wait for her to get to the shop before we could leave. When she got there we headed off. I do enjoy driving code 3 to incidents but at 2:30am I prefer sleep. So anyway I drove 100mph the whole time. Scary but the woman was complaining of 7 out of 10 abdominal pain, plus my boss was harassing me about going slow. Well we get there and her pain went from 7 to 9 out of 10. We got her in the ambulance and her husband wanted to come so he rode in the front with me. That is where the night took a turn for the crazy. The patient ended up having kidney stones but decided to stop taking her meds about 2 months ago. She had so many piercings setting off a metal detector would be a common occurrence but she wouldn't let us put an IV in because she was afraid of needles...

My experience up front was just as exciting. The husband was trying to fidget with the lights and buttons and I had to tell him to knock it off. He explained that he just wanted me to not be a distracted driver and he wanted to get to the hospital safely. Then he proceeded to pull out a portable dvd player. After that he started talking to me about nano technology and how DNA from sharks are curing blindness. Then he started explaining to me how the videogame series, Resident Evil was a cover up by the U.S. government for a cure for AIDS gone to far. I had to shake my head at that. Then he put his iPod on and started singing. We got her to the hospital and everything was fine. We filled out paperwork and returned to the shop. We got back into bed around 5:30am so I was able to get another hour of sleep before we had to get up.

Monday March 22nd


Monday night we had two legitimate 911 calls. First was a gentleman with COPD and a broken arm. He fell trying to fix his clock. We got there and helped him with his breathing treatment then rushed him off to the hospital. We got back to the shop around 12:30am we went to sleep about 1:00am or so then we got a call at 2:30am again for a gentleman who was bleeding profusely into his catheter. When we got there it was basically all blood. His blood pressure was 86/55 so yeah he wasn't doing good. It was one of those load and go situations. I again drove because my partner Ryan has all his endorsements so his scope of practice is a little more advanced than mine. We got the gentleman to the hospital after his nurse told us that this had been going on for four days. Awesome right? Well we got called back at 6:30am to return him to the retirement center so he wasn't as bad as we thought. Which is good.

But yeah that is about it for calls. We took a class this week on our monitoring endorsement. Nothing exciting. I can now test blood glucose, use a pulse oximeter, and put on a 3-lead heart monitor. We're going to do the other endorsements all together. IV monitoring, IV placement, medications and a few others. So I'm one step closer to being an aggressive EMT-B. I think that is what they are called.

Firefighting


The volunteer gig hasn't been to exciting, we had training the other night. Wildland this time. We learned about how these firefighters in South Dakota almost died because they didn't watch out for any of the watch out situations you're supposed to. 11 out of 15 watch out situations were violated. Then we practiced with fire shelters. We tried it without wind then we got the ventilation fan and did it with wind. That was fun. I just have one more meeting I need to go to before I am voted in as a full member.



The Wrap-Up


So yeah that is about it. Even on spring break I'm taking classes and am ridiculously busy. But that is okay because I don't mind the work and helping people is an awesome feeling. I know I've been saying this but I will try to update this more. Stay tuned!

Again I haven't forgotten about the blog.

I haven't forgotten about the blog I promise I have a lot that I will fill everyone in on this Sunday. So Stay tuned!

Haz-Mat Hands On, Volunteering, EMTing, etc.

So as most can see it has been a while since I have updated my blog. Honestly due to lack of content. It's hard to make school work and class time sound exciting. Well that changed yesterday when we started doing hands on Haz-Mat training.

 For our Fire Fighter I Certification we have to demonstrate the abilities to establish a haz-mat hot zone, and create a decon area while being able to practice proper decon techniques. It was nice to get back in my turn outs and get to hands on stuff again. It's weird, I was ready at the end of last semester to get done with the evolutions but after 8 weeks of class room boringness I found I missed being in my gear. A good sign perhaps. Anyway, our first tactic was to spot the hazardous material, figure out what it was, then establish a perimeter for the hot zone. We used a gas meter to monitor the air for the mininum required 19.5% oxygen requirement. We also monitored for CO, LEL and other gases. Afterwards we went through decon techniques. Monday we learn how to take off our gear while still being on air. I promise to get pictures of that because it might be hilarious. Here are a few pictures.

Stewart, Wunderlich (Pronounced Wonderlick, yeah, that's his real name), and I practicing Decon techniques.

Me rocking the gas meter. Apparently there is a class I can do online to get certified in using that. I think I'm going to go for it. 

Getting decontaminated or practicing for Dance of the Sugar-Plum Firemen, I'm not telling.

So yeah, that's been it for classes for the most part. We finished the ambulance and we have our class finals this week. Three finals this week. Friday we start new classes. One class is Fire Tactics and Operations so we will be doing more hands on stuff so expect more writings and pictures for that. Now on to volunteering.

So Wednesday was my first meeting with the Montana City Volunteer Fire Department. It was a business meeting where I was able to introduce myself and what not. Not ten minutes into the meeting were people joking with me and carrying on so I think I am going to fit in really well. I was assigned a mentor who is basically just around to show me how MCVFD does it. The funny thing is, is that the guy assigned to me for mentoring is my roommate's boss. So we joked around about all the expensive stuff my roommate has broken and got along awesomely. I stayed after the meeting to help with the monthly checklist on Engine One.  Engine one is pretty cool but they just bought a new engine. Engine Two as it's called is dare I say it, a very sexy looking fire truck. I would love to roll to fires in that. It is the picture to our left here.  But yeah, I overheard the president of the business meetings and the fire chief talking and basically I still have to go through the hoops of  applying but they said it was a no-brainer on hiring us on. Now when I say being hired on I mean being voted into the organization but they call it hiring us on because for Wildland work we'll actually get paid if we are called by DNRC. So that is pretty cool.

 I am planning on attending the Wildland Intermediate class at the end of this month which I am pretty excited for. I will then be one step closer to my Wildland Firefighter I certification. It's backwards in Wildland fire compared to structure fire in that Wildland Firefighter I is the best where as in structure fires Firefighter II is the highest. 

My EMT job is going well for the most part. I have had a few problematic patients. One that was extremely heavy but decided he wanted to walk himself. He was starting to collapse as he was going up the stairs but I swooped in and managed to catch him. Good thing I work out because the 260lbs he weighed was a lot to shoulder. The next patient we had that same night kept trying to rip his I.V. out of his arm and touch my partner's private areas, so I had her drive and I dealt with the patient. He did not attempt to go for my privates. 

Scheduling has been kind of off as there are a bunch of us new folk. But it seems as if I will be partnered a lot with this girl named Anna. She seems nice. They like to have a guy/girl partnership because there are some patients that do better with males vs. females and vice versa. I did my first overnight shift though last night. It was good. I worked that with Mike, a paramedic. He's the one that is going to help me with my endorsements. We were on call at a local hockey game. One of the perks of the job is free hockey games, plus the folks at the concession stands give us free food and drinks. Afterwards we went back to the shop and hung out. the nice thing about an overnight shift is that we get to sleep. The bad thing about an overnight shift is that the beds are less comfortable than cots and sleeping is hard to do. The shop dog stays there too and decided that at 4am I was the best person to play ball with. He was mistaken. I work again tomorrow at 7am to 7pm. Long shifts but it pays the bills. 

Other than that not much has really gone on. I'm discovering that being busy makes time go by rather quickly as this past week really didn't exist, but the days are getting longer and the weather is warming up so things are looking up. I'll try to update about finals and such here this next weekend. Stay tuned!

Refreshers and Fire Positions

So I'm tired. This is the third weekend I have had of schooling. But that's what happens I guess. This weekend at my job I had my 24 hour EMT refresher course. We went over a lot and covered a lot. The first night was pretty rocky because my boss was distracted but we learned how to spike bags, and intubate patients. So the ALS assist class turned into an ALS class. I still don't have that endorsement. Speaking of which I'm learning my monitoring endorsement. That consists of being able to use an oximeter which measures SpO2% or hemoglobin saturation. Only problem is that it doesn't distinguish what's saturating the blood. This means Carbon monoxide could throw off the readings. We will also be proficient in blood glucose readings and 3-lead heart monitor reading. Haven't done much reading into those yet but when I do I should be able to elaborate more.

Patient run wise this past week has been kind of intense. Apparently I get all the psyche patients. I can't have my trauma shears, pocket knife, forceps or anything in with me. However my partner decided to let one guy have his metal cane with him. I thought to myself, oh good, if he wanted to he could just beat me to death with that thing. I have to do patient care because girls aren't allowed to be with guy psyche patients. I had two of them. Then I had to do a Billings/Helena rendezvous in Bozeman. That wasn't bad.  A lot of driving. Other than that there isn't much going on, I have my EMT outfit and I will post one of those pictures here soon.

School is plugging along. Quizzes and doing fire/haz-mat scenarios with matchbox cars. That is pretty fun. I miss playing with toy cars sometimes. We checked the lighting systems and electrical systems on the fire truck and added brand new oil.

So last Tuesday I submitted my application to join the Montana City Volunteer Fire Department. The president of the meetings told me that no matter how much he tried he couldn't make them say no and I am now a volunteer firefighter. Last time I joined a department I had no idea what was to be expected of me and it ended shortly. But with more training, being in better shape and what not I am more prepared for what is to come. So yeah. I am a volunteer firefighter now. They have an average amount of calls and train a lot. So with the emt job and this my resume will be a little less empty and show more experience to back up the training I've received. Speaking of training I am now a fully certified Wildland firefighter II. I mean basically I can dig on a hand crew but it's another certification!

Other than that, not much is going on fire wise. It's snowy as heck and there haven't been a lot of fires. Stay tuned for more exciting events as they unfold!

Running Around Madness

Well hello everyone, it has been a long time since I have been able to update this. I have been really busy as of late. Here's the short version. School is busy, we are on 20 days of straight class, school was falling apart, and I recently joined an ambulance service. Now here's the long:

School

School has been good so far. Hazardous Materials has been intense. We have had a lot of stuff thrown at us in a short amount of time. We've had three quizzes in about two weeks and gone through 400 pages of material in 4 weeks. Doesn't seem that fast but with some stuff that could kill you super quick like you kind of want to take your time. In Emergency Apparatus Maintenance we've been greasing u-joints and what not, We cleaned the batteries and refilled them. Once we plugged those back in we hooked up the exhaust to fan system... then... we started checking out the air tanks for moisture. It was good up until the last one leaked all over me. But that is okay.


So with the retirement of our department head there has been a lack of leadership in our program. Instructors tell us to show up for classes then don't show up themselves. It's ridiculous. Instructors tell us to wear uniforms but wear jeans because they are in charge. Yeah, they are, but in a paramilitary structure such as the fire profession is, leading by example is key. Today though one of the instructors hit each of the points we were contesting, each of the problems we had if you will, and made a point to fix each one. It was good. That is about it on the school area of my life. 


Job

So I recently got a job with Eagle Ambulance out of Montana City. Ask around Helena and you'll realize that Eagle isn't well liked. Why, because the last person that was in charge ran it into the ground and burned a lot of bridges. The new lady who is in charge is trying to get us back up to being a respected ambulance service. So far on my first real day of work I had a trauma call. Lady with a possible hip fracture. I got there after being told to take a deep breath and busted out some vitals. I held c-spine and helped backboard her. We got her to the hospital. She was talkative and as cheesy as it is to say, She probably won't remember me but I will probably think about her from time to time my whole life.

We also have had a few hospital transfers. For instance we had two between here and Missoula yesterday. We also got to standby at a hockey game. It was nice to watch the game for free. The Bozeman Icedogs played the Helena Big Horns... I was torn as I am from Bozeman. But the Big Horns won 7-3.

So yeah the EMT job is pretty good. It doesn't pay well, but having a job where I feel like I accomplish something and I help people is worth it. Once I get my endorsements I will be paid more.

Conclusion


So yeah. That is about it in a nutshell. Having a full time job and going to school full time doesn't afford me much in terms of free time. At least not for another weekend or two. After that I will be able to recharge my batteries. But until then I promise to get more on this posting deal. Stay tuned!