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.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
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!
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!
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
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!
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!
Saturday, May 22, 2010
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.
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.
Monday, May 10, 2010
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!
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!
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
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!
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!
Saturday, April 3, 2010
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.
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.
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