Triage

I worked from 1700-2000. No calls. We did a drill on MABAS and mass casualty. We had a new triage system that we are finally going to start using. Very good training.

I ran errands for most of the day. All I want is a good call!

Flood

We were rather busy today. Mostly BLS, mostly back to back. We did transfers and MRIs. Psychs too. One ALS call for low blood sugar. Our patient was babbling and quite confused. His sugar was 46. We gave him an amp of D50 and he was speaking normally within about a minute-his sugar was 133. He had a very irregular heart rate without a history too; varying from 40-90. When I took his pulse I got 48, but he was asymptomatic.

Another ALS (16 miles running hot) for abdominal pain at a clinic. The lady was fine. They had all the wrong history. They told me she had her gallbladder out 2 weeks ago-it was actually removed 2 years ago. Nice. She refused an IV, and I was in no mood to fight, so we went without one. 

We were called to the psych facility to transport a patient ot the ER for an "evaluation." Neither my partner nor I could figure out why you would send a psych to the ER for an eval if they were already in the facility, but whatever. It turned out we were taking her because she had vaginal bleeding x2 weeks, was admitted from the ER yesterday, and didn't feel that it was necessary to tell them about it then. Oh well. She was taken back to the psych hospital just over an hour later.

Today was extremely hot. Polyester is not my friend. I think it got up to about 99 and it was extremely humid. It had to be 110 in some of the nursing homes. Even the toilet paper and kleenex felt damp. Yuck. 

We also had some bad storms. We had severe thunderstorm warnings and flash flood warnings. They weren't lying! We were taking a psych to the hospital across town during the worst of the storm. I was doing paperwork and my patient said, "You guys sprung a leak!" Sure enough, I look up and water is coming down in sheets through the weather stripping in the rear doors. There was probably 1/2" of standing water in the rig. In the meantime, all you could see outside was water. There was about a half mile section where the water was so deep I was sure that we were going to stall. It was about 1 1/2 feet deep in the middle and 2-3 feet near the curb. Several smaller cars stalled. We were making waves.

I called my dispatcher and told him that we would need an ark-not an ambulance for any other calls. He was funny. He was like, "Why's that?" I told him that we were currently submerged in 2 feet of water and that cars were floating by. He said it was the same by him. I told him I already had my floaties and blow up giraffe on, so I was good to go. He said, "You plan on getting out of the rig?" I said, "nope- the rig is filling up with water...we sprung a leak." All he said was. "Oh...." then he was really quiet for about 30 seconds. Then he said, "well, tell your patient it is just a humidifier." My patient piped in, "tell your dispatcher that your patient can hear him." I thought it was funny. My patient was a 19 y/o kid-he thought the whole cluster was absolutely hilarious.

Memorial Day

Had our Memorial Day parade today. It was a really good time. I got my one armed suntan. Woohoo! I think we hit a record high today. Besides the heat (which wasn't too bad) it was a perfect day.

Busy as a Bee

Five calls today. One was a mutual aid fire that we never made it out of staging for. Another for an electrical problem with smoke in the building. We did two rescue calls-one for a fall (cockroaches included) and one for a seizure, with a prolonged extrication because it was on a boat. Extra points to all on scene for not falling into the lake off the dock, and not losing any equipment into the water :). Then a washdown at a gas station. It was a good shift. I love being busy!

Transition

I'm at the firehouse today. Nothing going on. We finally got our state certificates for Firefighter II today. It's finally official! Yeah! I am now allowed to go interior on fires, which I am definitely excited about. I got my "new" gear ( tan instead of black) and my new helmet. Goodbye recruit. Hello probie!

Relocating

I am in the process of moving and my new place doesn't have wireless yet. So, I will be journaling on paper and then typing it up when I get a chance. Hopefully, I'll be back soon :)!

Mass

Very slow day. First call was for an "abdominal mass." Our patient had been seen earlier today at the hospital for a CT scan. When it was read by the doctor he found a mass and wanted her re-evaluated. She already had a history of a AAA. Her v/s were stable. A nice slow transport and an easy ALS call. We got that call around 1100. We didn't do anything until almost 1900-actually 1930.

We did a BLS MRI. Our patient was the sweetest little lady I think I have ever taken. We dropped her off, ran a couple errands, and got called to bring her back to the hospital around 2200. We slept all night-no calls.

Aggressive

Pretty slow day. Our first call wasn't until about 1300, and by the time we made it out to the ambulance they cancelled us. 

We sat around some more for a few hours. Then we got a psych transfer. Nothing special. We did almost all psychs for the rest of the shift. 

We did a transfer to the state mental hospital. We were told that our patient was very aggressive, was in 4-point restraints and was being sedated for the transport. Great. I poked my head into the room to see what we were getting ourselves into. He looked like a giant-massive head. He was probably 6'7 or so. He wasn't really sedated, but he wasn't yelling out either. He was cool with us for the 65 mile transport. Good times.

We did another psych to the local psych facility. A lot of depressed people recently. 

Called for hypoxia-pt on a vent. Those are always fun. The only guarantee is that the patient will be massive. Since we don't carry a vent, we would be bagging the patient all the way to the hospital. The gouy was about 400 pounds, and I requested backup for both the lift assist and somebody to help me in the back. The guy's sats would drop into the 50s, but come back up with suctioning. He had just been released from the hospital on the 19th. His blood pressure was about 70/P. That was quite nice too. By the time we got to the ER I got his pressure up to 117, and his sats were 100%. I must be a miracle worker today :).

Last call was for chest pain. It was a 17 y/o girl. Her chest started hurting at 0600 when she was in the shower. We didn't take her until almost 0800. Nice. She said that it was 8/10 pain, but freaked out when we gave her aspirin and started an IV. I have a feeling that'll be the last time she has chest pain.

Held over yet again. I have to go home and finish moving all my junk to the house.

Unresponsive

Only one call all day. We got toned out for a man who had fallen and that was unconscious. When we got on scene our patient was lying on the floor, semi-conscious. He complained of right shoulder pain. Other than that we couldn't get much out of him. We got vitals and that is when we started to worry. There were stairs going out of the house (probably 10 or so), so I called for a lift assist. The guy's heart rate was about 30, and his blood pressure was about 80/P. Not so hot. His O2 sats were also in the low 80s. We got him packaged (c-collar, backboard, the whole deal), and by that time three people had showed up for the lift assist. Out to the rig we went.

I hooked up the monitor and my partner got a line. We got a new set of vitals. We got out the atropine, pushed 1mg, and his heart rate came up to about 62. His blood pressure also came up to about 90. Good good good. That's what I like. I drove to the hospital, and my partner said that he became quite responsive on the way in.

All in all it was a good call. He was an elderly gentleman, so this is quite common. His rhythm just looked like a sinus brady, but I would be interested to see what a 12-lead says. He already had a history of MIs.

Black Cloud

I am now convinced that I have a black cloud following me wherever I go. The house will definitely not be anywhere near liveable by Sunday. I had several plumbers and heating/cooling people come in and give estimates. I didn't like any of them. I don't have enough money for all this! Damn. Oh yeah, and some of the floor boards are rotten and need to be replaced.

I packed for most of the day today also. I bought paint so I could finish the one bedroom. By 1830 I was so fed up with everything that I drove to the firehouse-just to get away from the apartment (and bullshit with the guys). The cool part-it has been pouring rain all day and completely nasty. I think I must have fooled someone because on my spontaneous drive to the firehouse it rained, but once I got there it was sunny. I outran the black cloud :). It did catch up with me about 30 minutes later though. I almost won.

Packing

Nothing good to write about. I have spent almost the entire day packing up my apartment. I think it's safe to say that I have accumulated a ton of crap since I moved in a year ago. Thank God I don't have much furniture or this would me a total nightmare. I have almost everything done...almost.

My house is another story. I have to be out of the apartment on Sunday. My house still doesn't have any interior walls. Or electricity. Or plumbing for that matter. I am in big trouble. Also spelled Homeless. Yeah. I'll have to pick up overtime so I have somewhere to sleep :)

Nothing Special

First call was for "unsteady gait." The page said x1 week. I spoke with the RN and she said that the patient would get weak and slump to the right side, become minimally responsive for about a minute, and then come around. This has been going on for a week. She had also fallen several times in the past week and had received no treatment. They did take an x-ray towards the end of the week which came back positive for fracture. They got results on Saturday. Her foot wasn't wrapped or anything-no treatment once again. Supposedly her last episode of weakness was on Saturday also.

The woman was 48 years old. She was very hard to understand. She didn't complain of any pain, but her ankle was swollen and black/blue. There was redness running up her leg that almost looked like the start of cellulitis.

During transport she would slump to the left (not the right like the nursing home said-maybe they're dyslexic). She was literally hanging halfway off the cot. I was constantly moving her back onto the cot.

I told the RN at the hospital about my concerns and she agreed. Possible neglect. We got ball rolling and hopefully the hospital will admit her so she gets some good TLC.

We did a BLS return...a psych...

Our last call was an 18 y/o girl that was a psych patient. We were taking her to a south side psych hospital. She looked like she was 9 years old. She said she does this on purpose. She's been to over 8 different hospitals so far this year.

Am I really still here?!

I should have been off at 0500. There was no medic on the schedule so I agreed to stay. I worked until 1700. A very long day. I'm tired. And I want to spend some time with my mom on mother's day!

I took my mom out for dinner after I got off at 1700. Not too relaxing considering I had to be back to work at 2000. I'll make it up next week. I got last second tickets to Jerry Seinfeld. Yeah!

We got a call for a gas leak around midnight. I was just excited that my officer let me go. I figured that since I was the medic I wouldn't be allowed to go. But, for a change, I got to go. The smell of gas was strong, but all we could really do was shut it off. We were there for maybe an hour. That was the first call I actually got to pack up for (SCBA). Not too exciting for most-but I had a good time.

I looked at next month's schedule and I am actually scheduled for a couple nights as the firefighter (not as the medic)!!! Finally :)

Can I go home now?

Long day. I was only supposed to work until 2000, but I agreed to hold over until 0500 for the sleep-in medic. Damn. We only did one call for vaginal bleeding. We were back in quarters by 1900, and I was wishing for another call by 2000. I hate slow nights. I want to do something :(.

Broken

I did mostly BLS calls today. We did some transfers, many psychs, and a couple of ALS calls.

The best call of the day, you ask?

A woman from a nursing/psych facility going to another long term psych hospital. She seemed okay when we first got her. They were sending her out because she left the facility and walked to the hospital across town. She starting talking once we got out of the facility. She said that all of her family is at that hospital-she was the only one that they let out. She had many health problems: both of her legs were apparently broken, but she had to "keep walking." Both of her arms became broken during transport. We also had to go in search of her heart meds for her "transplant." She was also pregnant. I asked her how far along she was and she said, very seriously, "oh, I'm pregnant with a premium...I usually have several a day." I told her that she must be a very busy lady. The only thing I could think of was that she meant preemies. Anyways, she also had a dislocated shoulder, a glass eye, and just had surgery on one of her hips. It was a miracle though, because once we got to the hospital and got her in her room, she was up and walking. She just has to keep walking...

Now that's what I call a save :)

Ghost Light

We did our last transport at 0400. It was a psych going from the suburbs into the city. She was depressed with suicidal ideations. She recently discovered that her husband was cheating on her. She was quiet the entire ride.

I had all the lights shut off in the back of the rig because I had finished my paperwork and my patient was nodding off. Every time we hit a bump, one of the lights would turn on, and just as quickly, shut off. Then it started happening even when we didn't hit bumps. Weird. It's kind of creepy because with how the lights are wired, we can't just turn on one of them. It is either the front two or the back two. Only the last one was flickering. It's probably the ghost of someone that died in that rig. Who knows.

Large Area Search

We did large area search training tonight. We had about a 45 minute lecture and then practicals. It was pretty good. We used a 200 foot rope, with knots tied at 15 foot increments. The officer would be on the end (while the other end was secured to a fixed point), then the other two on the crew would have a 10 foot piece of webbing to attach to the knot and do a 180 degree search. This would reoccur at each knot until you either a) ran out of rope, or b) hit a wall. You would then follow it back to the beginning and angle it slightly so that you get another section of the room. If you found a victim, all you had to do was call it over the radio and they would send in another crew to rescue them. We did several evolutions, cleaned up, and called it a night.

I found out that I will be going to the National Fire Academy in June. Yeah! I am taking a class on community fire prevention/education. It should be fun. Hopefully it will also be informative :). 

No calls today.

Ouch

We did several routine transports today. Mostly psychs.

Our first priority call was for a 20 y/o male who was cutting a box at work with a box cutter and the box cutter slipped. He put it right into his eyeball. Yuck. You really couldn't see too much, but what you could see was that his eye was cut diagonally almost right through the center, and his pupil was anything but normal. We drove on a priority to a trauma hospital 60 miles away so he could get into a surgeon.

We did a BLS MRI.

Then another priority-a woman in labor. She was 38 weeks pregnant with her bag of waters still intact. She didn't speak English, and I don't speak much Spanish, so it was an interesting call trying to understand each other. She was only 19. After we got her to the hospital and a Spanish-speaking nurse was found, we were told that she was only having one contraction an hour. I don't know, but she seemed like she was in a lot of pain the whole time she was with us. Oh well.

Shorness of breath at a home address. Nothing extremely interesting. He called us because he didn't want to go to the closest hospital. All his vitals checked out, and it was pretty much another routine transport.

Our first psych of the evening was a 24 y/o girl that tried to commit suicide-she cut her arm across her AC and another cut across her hand. She was upset because her aunt took her car and sold it for drugs. The girl had just been released from a 7 year sentence in prison and was on house arrest. She ran away once at the hospital, but was tracked down by the police and brought back.

Labor and Delivery

One call for a woman in labor. The nurse was a real treat. She wouldn't tell us anything about the patient. When I asked what was going on she responded, "well, she's obviously pregnant!" Yeah, like that's a problem. I gathered from the patient that she was 38 weeks pregnant, and thought she might be in labor. It turns out that she was having very few contractions that weren't regular. We took her directly to the labor and delivery floor, where, after checking her, the nurse said that she would be going home. Nice.

We had a shorness of breath, the usual psych patients, a guy that got stabbed in the eye, and a couple of BLS transfers. Nothing that great.

Day Off

I'm glad I finally have a day off. I just ran some errands and hung out with some family from out of town.

I got a message on my phone at 1900 saying I was supposed to have been at work at 1700. Oops. For some reason today never made it onto my schedule. A no call no show is not something I want on my record.

I plan on being a bum tonight. Maybe I'll watch a good movie.

GI Bleed

Today was relatively busy. We did several psych bounces. We did a call for a toothache and, of course, the patient wanted to go to a hospital 40 miles away. It never fails.

We did an ALS MRI-nothing special.

We had a guy that we were called to for a "psych," but when we got on scene, it wasn't. The guy was off his meds-insulin mainly. We checking his glucose, which was fine. He was complaining about itching and sores all over. He showed me one on his arm and that was enough for me. I was itching all night. They were little nodules and he was scratching them so much that he was making them bleed. Yuck. He thinks it is from his job, but I'm sorry, from what I saw, it looked like he had scabies. I was just disgusted. It was funny because after dropping the guy off in the ER, I was standing at the nurses station finishing my report, and the doctor walked out of the room with a disgusted look on his face and was scratching his arm and neck. Ha. It's not just me :).

We actually got about three hours of sleep before we got our next call. It was a priority coming out of an ER. When that happens, it is either a) cath lab, or b) peds. This time it was a baby. It was funny because my partner and I were just talking about peds and how we both get them all the time. We got on scene and found out that the baby had a GI bleed and every time she would pass blood (there wasn't even any stool-it was all blood) she would get lethargic and nod off. They said her heart rate had been in the 200s, but she was at about 130 for us. During the ride my partner said that she would get sleepy and her heart rate would drop into the eighties.

It didn't take long to get to Children's Hospital. I was running hot and on a highway. You can put two and two together. We dropped her off around 0630 and finally returned to quarters at 0750-just in time for shift change.

Nothing

No work no play. I've been doing lots of work at the house. Nothing too good to write about. No good calls either. I'm back to work tomorrow.

Shortness of Breath

Two calls for shortness of breath today.

The first one we were dispatched to came across as "20 y/o female not breathing." Of course we hauled butt, meeting up with another medic and a police officer on scene. They ran in with the AED while I got the clipboard and my partner got the jumpbag. I was the first one in the door; there was a young woman sitting in a kitchen chair in very mild distress. She said she just felt like it was hard to breathe. She didn't want to go by ambulance, but she finally gave in. She had a history of anxiety and had been sick with the flu all week. Nothing out of the ordinary-just another SOB call.

Second call was also for shortness of breath. It was an elderly woman sitting on the edge of her bed, with her oxygen already on, complaining that it was hard to breathe. She wasn't too sure about her history, but I got what I needed off of her prescription bottles. She had pitting edema in all extremities. Thank goodness she had one of those motorized chairs to get to the first floor, because we would have had a hell of a time getting her outside. Once in the rig we worked our magic, called the hospital and were on our way.

I forgot how much I absolutely love this time of year. It was a beautiful day and I made sure I took my time cleaning so that I could leave the bay doors open. Ahhh...I did some cleaning and training in the afternoon. Nothing out of the ordinary. I took some online terrorism awareness courses which were actually somewhat challenging. Something good to do with my free time I guess.

Buzz

I got off this morning at 0800. I headed home to get some stuff done around the apartment before I headed over to the house. I can't believe I only have 19 days left before I have to be out of my apartment. Yikes! I haven't done anything, and the house is nowhere near ready. 

I didn't even get to the house until 1100. I didn't want to get too dirty because I thought I had to work at 1700. I spread some grass seed and cleaned up some stuff in the garage. I put the sprinkler out in the yard...yep. That's about it. 

My backyard is getting beautiful-there are tons of flowers. The only bad thing is that when you have flowers, you get BEES!!! I am absolutely terrified of bees. I have never been stung before, and I am convinced that I am allergic. I figure since I have asthma and other allergies, there is a really good chance that I'm allergic. Thank God I only live like a block away from the fire house :). 

I was standing on the deck in the back when I heard a noise so loud is sounded like a 747 was flying right at me. It was a mutant bumble bee that I swear to God had to have been as big as a bird. Exaggeration, you ask? Maybe, but either way I don't like them one bit. 

People always make fun of me because I run around like a chicken with my head cut off until the bee is out of sight. But, make note: everybody else that just plays it easy (that I know of) has been stung. I have been running for almost 20 years, and I have yet to get stung. I am definitely convinced, and I will continue to run until I am unable.

I stopped by the fire house to check my mail and I noticed that I wasn't on the schedule for tonight. So, instead, I am going back to the apartment to attempt to start packing. Or, rather, to find something to do so I have an excuse not to be at the house.

Wait, Wait, Wait....and return

First call was a wait and return for radiation: burn and return. Right after that we were called for another wait and return for a doctors appointment. It was a 23 year old with a lesion on his lung going to a pulmonologist. He was being tested for diving, which included a chest xray. They thought he might have TB, so he's been on isolation at the hospital for 8 days. He was telling me about his work in the military and how it is so much different from civilian life. He was cracking me up when he was talking about boot camp. He said that they teach you that you can cry for physical pain, not emotional. They also go through character building every day where their officers berate them with foolish things such as, "the bullies in high school were right-you are a loser!" etc. I thought that was pretty funny.

Anyways, other than that all we did were some transfers-one back to a nursing home and one to a psych facility. Nothing too great.

We actually got to sleep for several hours at night. Just enough that I should be able to accomplish something tomorrow.

Fire fire fire

I got off at the ambulance company at 0800. No sleep all night-definitely not ready for 10 more hours at work. Oh well. I can't change it now. It's kind of wierd, but I'm almost happy to be going to work. I don't know if it is because my life is unbelievably stressful right now or what, but it seems that whenever I am off, I wish I was at work. I always think that when I'm not there they will get a good call, and of course, I don't want to miss it. It is kind of disturbing. I shouldn't want to be at work so much. Whatever.

I got to the fire house around 0820. I changed uniforms, made myself somewhat presentable and started in on my normal routine. Ambulance and engine checks first. Then I cleaned the living quarters. It's always the same; I wipe down the counters in the kitchen, clean the coffee pot and do the dishes. Then I put the stools up on the counter so I can sweep the floor in there, then the three bathrooms. Then I wash the mirrors and toilets, and emty all the indoor garbages. Then I sweep the hallways. Then I vacuum the day room, bunks, offices, and rugs. I mop after that so that I don't go over my clean floors with the vacuum. I do the kitchen, bathrooms, and gradually work my way out to the bay. Usually by the time I am done with all that (if I don't have any calls) it is about 1130. Just in time to order lunch.

Today we actually got to eat lunch without being interrupted-well almost. I was just finishing when the tones dropped. There were so many different radios and pagers going off (because we were all sitting together) that nobody could actually hear anything. I headed out to the bay to hear it better. "...fire department, you have an odor investigation...possible smoke showing."

I didn't think I would get to go, because for quite a while I have been told to hang back so that we have a medic in case we get a rescue call. My captain looked at me and said, "you're going." I was shocked, but very excited. Anthing to get out of the station, and possibly get a fire. I got my gear on and got on the engine. We headed towards the address. Dispatch came back over the radio and gave us an updated report; "...heavy smoke showing...confirmed structure fire in a detached garage." They toned out again for a quad, which brings in engines from four other departments. We pulled up and there wasn't too much smoke, but the garage was white, and you could see soot all over the front and smoke coming out of the eaves and the garage door. Since I am so new, I was told to do exterior. So, I pulled the preconnect and dragged it to the garage door. I flaked it out so that it didn't resemble spaghetti, and headed back to the engine to help the engineer. He already had the soft suction out, so I tagged the hydrant, hooked up the valve on one side, the soft suction on the other. The hydrant was really tight-whether it was just rusty or what I don't know. I felt like such a weakling-I was struggling to open the hydrant. I looked like I should have been on an episode of the three stooges. It was too tight to get it open without using all my body weight, so I was actually going around the hydrant with the wrench, around and around until it wouldn't go any further. Water was still leaking out of the bottom of the hydrant, which means the valve isn't completely open, but the engineer couldn't get it any farther either. Ha. Either way, I was excited to finally do something.

The interior crew knocked the fire down pretty quick. They let me come inside to see what was going on and to cool off some of the stuff in the garage that was still smoking. Good times. We had to wait for an investigator, so once it was cooled down I helped drag hose back to the engine and then got up on top to reload it. We were probably there for about an hour or so. A good use of the afternoon.

I felt sick for the rest of the day. Of course, as usual, we gorged out at lunch-on Chinese. I was stuffed, didn't get my 20 minute nap, and felt like the food was permanently lodged in my throat. I still felt sick by the time I got home. Note to self-eat sparingly while on shift unless I want to vomit on a crew member or a patient :).

After cleaning up the engine, I returned to my normal schedule. I washed both ambulances and the engine we used on the fire. Normally I was both engines, but I was cut short by about an hour, and it wasn't too dirty. Anyways, I did that, then pulled the cots out of both ambulances, disinfected everything, including up front, bleached the floors, let them dry, and reloaded them.

Then I did some training-working on ropes and knots with my partner. We were just putting everything away (it was about 1645) and the tones dropped-15 minutes before my off time. We were called for shortness of breath. The best part-I actually knew where we were going without looking at a map, and it wasn't a main road. It's getting better. We got back to the station around 1730, I did my report on firehouse and headed home by 1800.