And so then I became a firefighter....

[hensylee]

volunteers need training. When there is a 911 call, everybody in the county goes. Fire, EMT, ambulance, police - both paid and volunteer. My 98 y.o. neighbor had a brain aneurysm and died instantly. We called 911, she instructed how to do the mouth-to-mouth to my daughter who relayed to me and I did it, so they get involved, too. Quickly there were about 25 or more people in that little room and verhicles of all sorts everywhere in the yard. Many of those were volunteers who came for the experience of the training.

 

[gadgetman]

Here in Georgia, at least in the bigger cities, fire trucks are dispatched with the Ambulance to provide additional manpower (i.e. lifting some of the BIG folks into the ambulance ) and most cities have established a requirement for paid firefighters to also be basic EMT certified (i.e., able to perform CPR, stop bleeding, etc).

Volunteer firefighters usually show up because we are all on the same paging system with the EMTs and in a small community you know almost everyone and want to lend a helping hand. I usually respond to accidents near my home in my own vehicle (red lights on). I can usually get there quickly and can provide updates on the scene.

 

[hensylee]

Gadge: Where is Richland? near what?

 

[Granbonny]

Hi G-Man

Hi G-Man

I just sent you a private message. Look under your Welcome Gadgetman...click on....I, too, live in Ga. and bet Ann wants to know where Richland is too. ..Folks, wasn't it Sue, SJJ, that lived in Columbus, Ga. and had her surgery last year at UAB...? Maybe Gadgetman can e-mail her? Bonnie

 

[gadgetman]

Hi Everyone,

Richland, Georgia is a small (and I mean SMALL--less than 1400 people and dogs) town on Georgia 520 and Highway 280. It is about 35 miles south of Columbus, Georgia. I was raised about 9 miles from here in Lumpkin, Georgia but got caught up in the DRAFT (remember those days) during Viet Nam and "JOINED" the Air Force in 1967. Twenty Six years, 2 months, and 23 days later I retired from the Air Force and moved back "HOME".

Grandbonny, I'll E-Mail you a reply right after I post this.

Good Night to one and all.

 

[hensylee]

good for you - going home. I, too, live in a wee town. All we have is WinnDixie and WalMart. Many people are returning home after they go see the world. Not much here to keep them when they are young but nice to get out of the rat race when they are ready to 'settle' again and come back where there's NO traffic. And you know everybody in the county. My roots are Camilla. (nor Camelia)

 

[Harpoon]

No photos of me "in action" as of yet but I gather last night I was on TV....


Oh gawd... Just what I needed too....


Was out to shoot a basketball game for the newspaper and one of the girls that was playing (high school girls game) got tripped up and fell on a breakaway planting her chin into the floor. Had a nice little "divot" just under her chin which bled for maybe two minutes then stopped on it's own.

Coaches were kinda looking at eachother not realy knowhing what to do so I walked on the court and set my camera down. One of the coaches had come out with a few sterile gauze pads and a butterfly band-aid... Yeah, that'll work.......


I took the gauze and the gloves, looked her over some (did an abbreviated assessement leaving out stuff like BP 'cause I didn't have a sphygmomanometer, say THAT ten times fast, to check it) Basically told the girl to hold the gauze in place. Her parents were there and I asked if they wanted me to call for an ambulance (I carry my cellphone ALL the time, 'cept in the shower) and they said no so I told them to help her get dressed and take her to the ER to get checked out.


Then...

This morning after dropping my wife off to work (she's working extra this week since one of the other editors had a baby) and getting home to take a shower before my math class, the pager goes off with a car accident about a mile or so from my house. Two cars met in an intersection and a woman driver from one car was hurt.


I'm not even a bonified EMT yet... Oy.


I got a parking sticker for the car though now. =)

 

[Ross]

Pretty soon you won't legally be allowed to pass up someone in need of medical assistance. How's that grab ya?

 

[gadgetman]

Ross,

Here in Georgia they have already established a "good samaritan law" that any certified EMT or Firefighter (so indicated by either a tag or sticker on the vehicle) MUST stop and render any aid they can. The only exception to this is if you feel stopping at the scene would place you and your vehicle in danger.

Of course, someone at the scene will have to identify you as such and report it to authorities that you failed to stop.

I plan on going to my first Volunteer Fire Deparment meeting tonight to say Hi to all the guys and to show them that I'm still upright. After a full recovery and OK from the Doc my only restriction will be entering a burning building. This is primarily because of my AICD. If it zapped me while inside I would suddenly become a liability instead of an asset. I will operate the pumps, direct and control exterior areas and monitor the overall situation.

Most Volunteer Fire Departments are lax on the physical part of its members. If you are breathing and able to drag a hose and eventually pass the 60 hour course you can be a volunteer. Paid Departments require extensive physical testing on a regular basis.

 

[Harpoon]

Ross>>I dunno how that side of it works just yet. If I'm in a position to help I will, but I may not always be that way and I think there are levels to what kind of help is acceptable for given situations.

If I'm out someplace and I have my son with me (he's 4) and we encounter a person who needs medical assistance, I may not provide everything that I'm capable of if it means neglecting my son's needs at the same time or putting him in a situation he really shouldn't be in.

It's all up to individual situations.


At the very least I can call for help, maybe ask someone else who's there to keep an eye on my kid while I'm trying to do CPR or something.

I don't neccesarily have to show up to every call our fire department gets. Obviously they want everyone to show up all the time, but that's never going to happen. I'll get to what I can.

Professional firefighter/EMS provider is of course a different story, but not neccesarily if they're off-duty, again, it depends on the situation. In NYS most of the "good samaritan law is geared towards protecting people who offer assistance out of the goodness of their hearts (even if it's not very helpful) from litigation.

 

[gadgetman]

Harpoon,

Under our law anyone providing assistance is protected from liablity if something goes wrong. Some people can't be saved no matter how much skill we possess. It saddens me to respond to an auto accident and see injuries to people that "REFUSE" to wear a seat belt. >>>>>SOAP BOX ALERT<<<<<< My first fatality accident involved an SUV that lost control and rolled several times, stopping on the roof. The driver and front passenger had belts on (we had to cut the belt to get the driver out) and suffered some bruises and cuts but both rear seat passengers did not have belts on. One suffered a badly broken arm and was able to crawl out of the vehicle. The other went through a "washing machine" and wound up on the roof inside the SUV. He died soon after we arrived on scene. Pulling that body out and covering it with a sheet was not fun.

Of course a smart Lawyer could make your life a living hell but I don't know of anyone yet that has put that portion of the law to test.

Good luck to you.

 

[Harpoon]

You put photos taken at the scene either by EMT's paramedics or by police investigators up in front of a jury then ask them how, in their right minds, do they expect a person with the limited training an EMT or paramedic gets, could save the life of such a person who's been through such a horrendous crash...

You point out that if they were wearing their seatbelt, they probably could have walked away from the car after being freed by the firefighters on scene.


On some level, most "level-headed" people know the limitations of even high skilled surgeons when it comes to fixing a patient with that level of trauma to the body.

Most juries couldn't find neglegence in the direct care.

Oh, and in multiple casualty accidents, we get to decide which patients are a "lost cause" so that we can focus our attentions on the one's who would benefit most. Ideally, we save everyone all the time, but then again, IDEALLY, no one would need saving in the first place.

 

[Harpoon]

In my "grand" quest to become a bonifide Emergency Medical Technician I did half of my ten hours of required hospital observation time today at a local Emergency Room....


Checked in and got squared away, they gave me a scrub shirt to wear over my street clothes and sent me off to one of the beds to watch as a nurse attached leads for a heart monitor on a little girl who came in with the flu and something (the reason for the heart monitor I suspect though I didn't ask) and she (the nurse) had me help put on the leads, telling me where they should go (as if I of all people needed to be told that one...)

Everything's going good, though the kid's starting to turn a little green...


Just a little, not too much though....



Uurp...


Ummm.. Sorry Mr....


Yeah, all over my scrub shirt and enough to soak through and get into the sweater I had on underneath so I excuse myself (I was finishing the last of my leads when she upchucked) and tossed the scrub shirt in the soiled linens bin then out to my car to remove the sweater, the t-shirt under that was OK.

All in all, it was a good day. Not even an EMT yet and I'm getting puked on...

Made a few runs with an orderly delivering admitted patients to their rooms. Changed a few O2 tanks, helped the ER doc (held one of those kidney bean shaped trays) while he padded some gauze into the wound where a guy had had a tooth pulled...

Nothing too exciting really, no real blood, guts (vomit doesn't count) or gore...

Chatted up some with one of the paid paramedics I had been shadowing for that story I did after they came in with a patient from a nursing home.


I gotta do another 5 hours on the 27th.

I'll say though, it's pretty neat being on the "giving" end rather than recieving in the hospital.

Oh yeah, I also got to watch from the control room as they did a CT scan of a patient's brain, the one that came from the nursing home.... That was slick.

They appreciated my story about being stuck in an MRI scanner for over two hours because the computer kept crashing....

 

[Harpoon]

Making the grade.... Or at least trying.

Making the grade.... Or at least trying.

So Lastnight (Monday) was practical skills night for me.

An ominous date to say nonetheleast...

Iffin' you're keeping score, you'll know that my tricuspid valve was cut out and a "fake" one put in March 14th, 2003.

Two years later, I was knee deep in bodies covered in stage blood wearing hospital scrubs with tear aways. We had stations set up for all the major skills an EMT-B is supposed to know backwards and forwards in their sleep.


My weak points were in assessment, both trauma and medical.

And now I know I need work on the AED too.

I made a few mistakes, ran too fast through both assessments and missed a lot of critical points (instant failures.)

My AED station was second on the list and I was hampered by pads that wouldn't stick to the manequin, I actually got knocked off for that even though I stated that the pads were too old to stick (they've been using them for at least 5 years) and vocalized that in a real life situation I would have gotten another set and secured them properly. Oh well.

You're allowed to miss three stations (though you have to repeat them and get them right the second time through or you fail for the night.)

In the spinal immobilization (backboarding) you put the headblocks on and secure the head to the backboard last before reassessing PMS and loading off into the ambulance.

I know this.

Every time I practiced it I'd catch myself. My instinct is to put the blocks on first, keep the head still, but you're supposed to start at the midsection, then do the feet, then the head LAST.


In the station I did the blocks first.

Failed four stations.

I'm done.

There's a refresher class in September that I can take then take the skills night and final exam again. Got all spring and summer to study...


I am certified for BLS though, first aid/CPR with AED.