Christmas Music

A very slow day to begin with. We didn't do anything until the evening. I was hoping to keep it that way. Although quite boring, I would prefer to do nothing and get paid for it sometimes than cart around people that should be taking a taxi. Oh well.

All hell broke loose around 1800. We were called to a nursing home for chest pain. We got on scene, did our workup and determined that it was most likely a respiratory problem and not cardiac. Our patient had crackles in his lungs, just on the right side...probably pneumonia.

We had just made it back to quarters and got into bed (by this time it was around 2200 after getting dinner, etc) and we were called to a stand-by emergency room for a psych eval. Okay, no biggie. Just grab and go, drop 'em off and go back to bed. Well, it wasn't that easy. The nurse only gave us like maybe 1/16 of the story. She was actually an overdose. On cocaine, meth, trazadone, a bunch of psych meds, and pain killers. She was dizzy and nearly fell over getting onto the cot. Then she was hallucinating in the back of the ambulance. She said, "I really like what you've done with the place. Those curtains are beautiful!" Now mind you, we don't have any curtains, and our rig is definitely not beautiful. Then she asked why we were outside, and starting flipping out again trying to get the blanket over her head to suffocate herself. A little Narcan did the trick (kinda) but she was still hallucinating when we left the ER.

Made it back to quarters again. Laid down for 15 minutes. Called to transfer a psych to the state mental hospital. I was cursing and going on for several minutes because it is over 60 miles away. We got to the ER and I walk with the stretcher past the nurses station. The nurse grabbed my arm and was like, "you can't go in there without security!" I was like, "well, I wasn't planning on it, I'm just getting the cot out of the way." Whatever. So, we wait forever for paperwork, as usual, and finally we meet our patient. Before we even get a chance to open the door she opens it and yells at my partner, "you don't need to be knocking on my door, it is rude!" He never even touched the door. It took a lot of convincing, or rather several large security guards, to get her onto the cot. She loved the four point restraints. Ha. And even made my partner swear which takes quite a bit. The ride was actually quite funny. First I was listening to like pop/rock music, but I can't stand commercials, so then I changed it to country. Then that had commercials eventually too, so I changed it to Christmas music. Ooooh...that's when the fun started. She hated the music. So what did I do, you ask? I turned it up. And we both started singing, quite loudly I might add. For over 40 miles of the trip :). When we got there she said we stole her candy and that my partner's sister was a bitch, which she was referring to me. Then she got to fight with the guards at the mental hospital, so we headed home. Another life saved.

We did another transfer to a nursing facility out of the ER. This place is quite creepy. We always call the buildings bomb shelters. They are very funny looking and out of place, and there are maybe 50 of them. Very hard to find the one you need. And the lady was hacking and coughing all over my rig. Ugh. Disgusting.

We got back to quarters at 0654. At least I wasn't held over.

Your Patient

Busy day. We did a four hour ALS MRI. Those are my least favorite calls. In fact I hate doing them. It drives me crazy every time I get dipatched to one.

Lots of silly transfers....mostly rehab, psychs, and a few going back to nursing homes.

And I forgot my coat at home today so I froze to death until the evening. Then we got a call going to a nursing home near my house so we stopped afterwards and grabbed it.

Then we were dispatched for chest pain at a nursing home two towns away. The roads were kind of slick and it was really foggy out, so it took us a little while to get there. The lady was fine. All her vitals were good. She said it just hurt when she would breathe. She was just diagnosed with pneumonia/bronchitis last week.

When we were leaving the ER the FD was bringing a guy in that I had taken last week with chest pain. He was out of a nursing home. And one of the guys said, "yeah, we had to pick up your patient." Like the nursing isn't in their district. Dummies. That was the first time we had seen them at the ER all day, and we had been there at least 5 times already.

Took a crazy pysch patient that reminded me of a toddler because she asked "why" about everything. And she was being an ass, so we cranked the Christmas music and sang all the way to the psych hospital. The best song is actually a Hawaiian song called "Melekelikimaka" which means merry christmas, or happy Christmas. Yep. I went to the national fire academy and met some really cool guys from Hawaii. And I learned a lot. But anyways, it was an okay shift.

I was only peeved when we were woken at 0430 for a medicar call going to same day surgery...which doesn't even open until 0600. The nurse had a fit and flipped out on my partner and I, like we wanted to bring him early, like we didn't want to still be in bed. Hmph.

No...Just call 9-1-1

I started work as usual at 0700. We got a call at 0712. We were called for shortness of breath. The only bad part was that the nursing home we were sent to is about a 30 minute drive even with lights and sirens. So, we get down there, making decent time, and pull into the nursing home. We hit the "on scene" button on the computer in the rig, and just as I am taking off my seatbelt and opening the door, my dispatcher beeps us on the Nextel, "You guys can disregard...the facility is calling 9-1-1." I told dispatch, "But, we are already here...we're going in right now." She says, "Well, now they don't want us they want to wait for 9-1-1. You guys can stand down and return to quarters." I was like, whatever. We got back in the rig and left. I don't understand the nurse's logic. You call a private ambulance and accept a 30-40 minute ETA. The ambulance pulls into the parking lot as you are on the phone with dispatch asking for another ETA. They tell you that the crew just pulled up. So now you decide that the patient is too critical to wait and call 9-1-1, after 30 minutes? What the hell. I mean, if that floats your boat, by all means, but it just confused the hell out of me.

We left there and got back to quarters about 40 minutes later. I had just gotten my boots and socks off when dispatch, once again, sends us lights and sirens to a nursing home about 30 minutes away. We get dressed, get in the rig and head out. We are called for "Tachycardia...the pt is also complaining of SOB, fever and altered mental status." Okay.....

We get on scene after dealing with every single idiot in the world on the road we were on, and head inside. We get to the room and speak with the caregiver. She says that the patient was up, talking, eating and even brushed her teeth this morning. When she came back to check on her she was, well, not herself. Our patient was slumped over in her wheelchair, wasn't speaking, had a blood pressure of 70, a blood glucose of almost 400, and had a heart rate around 130 with an elevated T-wave. Yeah. Needless to say we didn't stay and play long. We were heading out to the rig and the caregiver hands me her cell phone, and said, "It's the family, they want to talk to you." I politely declined and said that I couldn't share any patient info over the phone. The caregiver asked me if we were going to go to her desired hospital (which was about 30 minutes away). I told her we would try, but there was a 99.9% chance we would be diverted. She got pissed and told us they didn't like the closest hospital. I aksed if she was a DNR, and the caregiver said yes...but of course she couldn't produce it. To make a long story short we went to the closest facility. We got her blood pressure up to 100 systolic, but she was big time messed up. I'm sure she's in ICU right about now.

We did a transfer for a hip fracture.....

Then a psych transfer. This woman was absolutely disgusting. She was psychotic. Very upset about everything. She had been smearing feces and menstrual blood all over the walls and her body. Her hair was all matted. And she had sores on her feet from never wearing shoes. Ugh. She was completely uncooperative, then laughing, the yelling, then asking about our credentials, and asking to see another doctor. Yeah. So, we ended up cranking the Christmas music up and singing aloud for the whole three mile transport. :) Yeah, we're evil...going to hell on the express bus.

All in all, a good shift.

Elvis

First call right off the bat was a psych transfer. We got to the ER and it was a miracle-the paperwork was done and waiting for us! Whoa.

I finished my paperwork and went to meet our patient. He seemed alright. I hadn't really read into his papers, so I didn't get the whole story right away. I did notice that his feel looked blistered and had soot all over them. I just though, "hmmm...odd." Then I spoke with one of the security guards and got the truth. Apparently the guy doesn't like to live in his house, so he roams around the county and stays at campgrounds and basically lives off the streets. He was brought in by the police yesterday because he was found at one of the local campgrounds lighting a picnic table on fire, and in the process nearly catching the brush on fire. And that's not all. He proceeded to get up on top of the table, start dancing, and singing Elvis songs. Nice. That would have been a sight to see.

Long Month

It has been quite a long month of the same old crap. I really haven't had any good calls whatsoever.

Today has been a typical day. Well, kind of. We have only done four calls so far. We did a couple BLS calls in the morning. We just did a call for "bleeding" that was actually for an ulcer that started bleeding on a lady's leg. The bleeding didn't worry me too much, but the fact that her leg was really swollen above the wound, that I couldn't get a pedal pulse, and that her capillary refill was +3 worried me. Oh well, I'm sure she'll be fine.

We also did a psych right after that. I walked into the room to get him on the cot and he had blood streaming down his arm from where he had an IV. By the time I got gloves on there was blood everywhere-a nice little pool on the floor, all over my gloves, and all over the bed. Good times. The best part was that the RN was rushing us to get him out of the room because she had a squad coming in. Well, they couldn't use the room anyways because housekeeping needed to sanitize it all now that it was covered in blood. Gotta love it.

Now I am back in quarters, just chilling. I have homework to do...

BLS

A complete BLS day. The only call that we did that was ALS was a burn and return (radiation). Pretty boring.

Most of our calls were psych transports. Nothing good either.

I am off until Tuesday, so hopefully I'll have something by then...

Deer

I haven't posted in forever. I've had a lot of crap going on....

Anyways, life is the same. I missed a structure fire today. I don't feel too bad because we went mutual aid and only did change on quarters-they struck out the box as soon as they got in the station.

But, the reason I am posting is much more, well, funny.

After returning from a rescue call this morning, the crew that was working was doing house chores, etc. One guy was out in the garage and he heard something behind him. He turned around and a deer had run into the bay. The deer was wounded-bleeding from god only knows what. (Walk in rescue call?) Anyways, so the guy is yelling at the others not to move because, they were all in the "house" part of the station and he didn't want anyone to get hurt. Meanwhile, one of the other guys was in the training room and heard a commotion and the one firefighter yelling, but he figured people were screwing around (as usual). Well, the deer ended up running into the door that separates the bay from the house and left snot marks everywhere and scratched up the door. It turned around, as the one firefighter is hiding in the workout room, and runs into the dayroom, getting blood all over the carpet, table, and chairs. The firefighter that was in the fitness room called the police station next door and told them that they needed to get over here and help. Well, needless to say, the cops thought he was joking. The deer eventually ran out of the bay, leaving only a trail of blood and snot.

Good times. I wish I could get the pictures, but they aren't on the shared disc. Very funny though.

I did a practice CPAT test on Saturday. Let's just say that I am joining a gym on Tuesday, because otherwise the only thing I'll be leaving in on test day is an ambulance.

Not too many good calls recently. I have had a few funny ones.

I had a lady that kept yelling "can someone please get me a gown" every thirty seconds for the hour we waited for her paperwork in the ER. They were getting slammed-two full arrests at once.

Tornado

A couple days ago we had some really bad storms. On my way to work I could see heat lightning, but it didn't look bad. We got a rescue call right off the bat, and it was still okay outside-it wasn't even raining yet.

By the time we were about two minutes from the hospital it was hailing. By the time we got into the ER you could hear the sirens going off outside and the intercom at the hospital saying "code yellow." Which is their tornado warning. We hauled ass to get everything together and get back up to our station. I was doing my paperwork and I had to call dispatch to get times. The phone rang and rang and their was no answer. I thought for sure that the tornado had taken out my town. But, they apparently didn't feel like answering the phone.

The tornado was sighted in the town just north of the hospital, and headed towards the hospital (south). Basically we had to drive right back through the storm to get to quarters. The roads were flooded, shit was flying everywhere-leaves, sticks, trash. We were making waves going down the road. It was so windy that every time my partner took his foot off the accelerator, we got blown into the other lane. Crazy.

When we got back to the station there were tons of people here. A lot of people don't have basements, so we all come to the firehouse when there's a tornado warning.

Anyways, we got back for maybe 15 minutes and got dispatched to another call. Nothing big, but by this time it was raining like crazy. I looked like a drowned rat by the time we got to the ER.

It was an interesting night, to say the least.

I found out the next morning that a tree in my backyard got struck by lightning. It is a huge willow tree, and the branch is literally split to the core. It will definitely take out my fence if it falls.

Chocolate

I ran all day in Chicago. I didn't mind too much because for once I actually knew where I was going. We did mostly BLS transfers. Nothing exciting, but I met some nice people.

We took a lady from a suburban hospital to a home address in Chicago. She was in her early eighties and her daughter was with her. Neither spoke more than a couple words of English-only Russian. So, needless to say, we had a hard time communicating. I was in back, and my partner was driving. We got the address, but the daughter was trying to tell my partner where she needed to go. We made it to the apartment complex eventually. It was an odd place, almost like a planned community. It had a nursing home, senior living, regular apartments, school, church, etc. I don't think we would have found it if the daughter hadn't been with because the address was off a main road, but it was just the address to the complex, not the apartment. Anyways, we got there and as I was getting out of the ambulance, the daughter said in broken English, "wait...wait..." and she was digging through her bag. Then she pulled out a box of chocolate truffles and handed them to me. She said, "for you...thank you...thank you." We took her mother upstairs and said our goodbyes. It's not too often that people are actually appreciative-and we didn't really even do anything but give them a ride.

We did a couple more transfers, but got out of the city on a whim. They sent us on a priority from Chicago back up to Waukegan. That was over 25 miles running hot. It was for an altered mental status, but when we got on scene we got the rest of the story. The status was not normal, but had been abnormal for several days already, and they were really sending him out because he had a fever of 100.1 that was down to 98 by the time we got there. Yeah. Good times.

We did several psych bounces, and a return to a nursing home in Cook County. The place isn't the best, but I have never seen it in such terrible disrepair as I did last night. We took the lady into her room and I heard a chirping noise. It was the smoke detector in the room. I told the CNA that they need to change the battery and he looked at me like I was crazy. Then the nurse was on break, so I was sent to the other side of the nursing home to get a signature. On my way over I passed probably 5 or 6 smoke detectors that were either hanging from the ceiling by the wires or that were simply torn down. There were also about 4 large emesis basins lining the hallway because the roof was leaking. Really nice. That place should be shut down.

We went back up north and stopped for gas. I was pumping and a lady walked out of the station and said "Hello!" She sounded rather drunk, and I just said hi and went back to my pumping. I watched her walk to the other side of the building and start dancing. She only had a t-shirt on and it was pouring rain. By the time we left she was deep in conversation with the wall at the laundromat next door.

Ladder Fight

I have been really busy recently. Work is keeping my social life to a minimum, as usual, and school just started again on the 24th of August. I am taking five classes, just to make sure I have no free time :). 

Again, I have been having trouble sleeping more than 2 hours at a time, so consequently, I end up doing all of my chores half asleep. Last shift was no exception.

I was out in the bay checking out all the rigs. I had already checked out the ambulances, the command vehicle, the brush truck and the engines. I only had one engine to go and I would be finished. I walked around the back of the older engine, and my typical sleep-walking self wasn't paying any attention. I walked straight into the ladder hanging off the side (and protruding about 2 1/2 feet off the back of the engine). I was seeing spots for about a minute afterwards. I cracked myself up because the first thing I did wasn't to curse or check for blood; I looked around to make sure nobody saw me make a fool of myself. I had a nice lump on my head (thankfully concealed by hair) and a bit of a red forehead for an hour or so, but I was okay. Thank God, because both of the guys I was working with were into their own little projects. They probably wouldn't have found me until we got a call.

A few brain cells lighter, and I am still pushing through the days. More work lies ahead. I have two days off this month.

Going Steady

It didn't seem like we ran very many calls today. When I finally counted them up in the evening we had already done six. We were steady all day, but we made it back to quarters several times throughout the day.

We did several psych transports. A call for back pain at a nursing home. The lady seemed completely fine. She was; we took her back to the nursing home with a perfect bill of health several hours later.

We had a lady with an allergic reaction from a cleaning solvent. She wasn't wearing gloves and she got a rash on her hands and said that she had hives on her face. They were gone by the time we got there, but she said her face felt tight and she was itchy. The miracle drug Bendryl cured that. Another save...

We took a 15 year old girl that was a cutter to the psych facility.

No really good call. Just more of the same.

Nursing Supervisor

Today was way too long. We ran all day...and all night. I feel like I have the flu. I just need a few hours of sleep.

Only one truly memorable call for the shift. I am blanking on most everything right now. We were called to a nursing home for a fall-patient still on the floor. We got on scene and a lady met us at the door. She said she was the "nursing supervisor," and starting giving us report. She said that our patient fell and probably has a broken shoulder. We asked her if the fall was witnessed. She said, "I am speaking now. When I am done telling you the story-then you ask questions." I just looked at my partner and rolled my eyes. So, the nurse finishes her little speech and still hasn't answered us. So we ask again-several times actually, but we never got an answer. Then we asked how she fell. She didn't answer. So we expanded a bit, asking if she slipped or tripped, etc. The nurse said, "When you're 96 years old, you just fall!" Okay...

We got to the patient and she was still on the floor, propped up with pillows and had a sling on her arm. She said her arm hurt, but other than that she was fine. She looked like she was in a lot of pain. She also had a huge knot on her head. We did our workup, got a c-collar on her, put her on a backboard, and did our vitals. She was writhing in pain-her shoulder was obviously deformed.

Because we never got a straight answer from the nurse as to whether it was witnessed or not, we did an ALS workup including an IV. (We also needed the IV for pain meds.) Anyways, when I took her blood pressure it was 206/126. We got the IV, and the woman yelled out in pain. The nursing supervisor came stomping down the hall asking us what we needed an IV for, because this was "just a simple fall." We tried to explain, but she wouldn't listen and stormed right back out of the room. The RN also told us that we must call the hospital before we leave. Well, we didn't call before we left because that's not our protocol.

She was pissed. So, she was calling our company to complain instead of assisting us.

We got the lady out to the rig, did another set of vitals, gave her morphine and meds to decrease her blood pressure. She was doing alright.

We got to the hospital without a problem. Then I got a page saying we need to call operations. I called and the nurse, sure enough, called in a complaint. She said we were rude, we initiated care without her approval, that we did unnecessary treatment and that we didn't consult her before we did anything. She told the call taker that we didn't need to give her morphine IV, that we could have given it P.O., and that she really didn't need morphine anyways, she could have given her tylenol. Nice. I just told operations that we followed our pain management and hypertensive protocols, and that's that. As far as I know the complaint was dropped, but I sure don't want to run into that nurse again.

Where is Lake County?

We were busy all day. Every called pulled me closer and closer to Chicago. Don't worry-we finally made it.

We were sent on a priority to a home address in Chicago. There was tons on construction, so every street that I wanted to turn on, I couldn't. Ugh. We finally made it-on a one way street with cars parked on both sides. We pretty much shut down the street. We were called for "general weakness." We got inside this apartment building and had to maneuver the cot down and around on a ramp to get onto the first floor. I cut a corner a little too close and caught it with the bottom of the stretcher. Yeah, so I broke the wall! The base board ripped off (about 1 1/2 feet of it) along with about six inches tall of the past 80 years worth of paint. Oops. I just kept walking. We tried to get on the elevator, but the cot wouldn't fit...it wouldn't fit in the freight elevator either. So, we left the cot downstairs, and carried the jump bag and monitor up with us. The apartment door was open, and we were greeted my a very surly guy in a wheelchair. He was a paraplegic, and a very crabby one might I add. I asked him what was wrong, and he said his colostomy and urostomy bags came off. Great. He said otherwise he was fine.

We took him in the wheelchair to the first floor. He was probably about 130 kg and there was no way we were going to lift him out of the chair and onto the cot. He said he "rolled" onto the wheelchair, so he said he would "roll" onto the cot. That wasn't too pleasant. I got his butt in my face, and he only got about halfway on, so we had to pull him the rest of the way up. He was soaked in urine and feces. It was dripping off his legs. And all over the cot and floor. My partner ran his wheelchair back upstairs while I got a history, etc. We got a move on out to the rig. We ran BLS-nothing I can do but get him to the ER so they can put his colostomy back in.

It started to pour rain outside. As it was, I was stuck in the back of a tiny little rig with a smelly man that was covered in urine and feces. Now I can't run with the windows open because we will probably drown. I called report, and turned on the exhaust fan. I was pretty much sucking the wall to get any fresh air I could out of that little hole. Disgusting, I know. Then the rig started leaking again. Sheets of water were falling into the back through the weather stripping-soaking out jump bag. To make things even better, the entire ER bay was full, so we had to unload the patient outside and take him in. I looked like a sewer rat by the time we were done. Yuck.

We did several psych calls, a call for altered mental status, and a call for a guy with a 104 fever. I got off an hour and a half late. I think I only did two calls in Lake county. The rest were south.

10-50 No Car Found

I just got back from another call. We were called for a check up on a 10-50. It was at the furthest edge of our district. When we got on scene, all I saw was a squad car. I asked my partner, "um...where's the car?" We just couldn't figure it out. Not wanting to sound stupid on the radio and say that no car was found (you know, just in case we find one in the forest or something) we just put ourselves on scene. We didn't give a scene size up, which, of course, pissed off everyone back at the station because they wanted to know what was going on.

Anyways, I got out of the rig and headed towards the squad. There was an officer and a guy standing outside. The officer said that there was a girl in the car too, and that she keeps nodding off. At this point, I still wasn't understanding what was going on, so as I went to talk to the girl, I spoke with the cop. He said that the couple was in a taxi and he missed the turn. Rather than turning around, he tried to make it at about 60 mph. Needless to say, he didn't make it, went into the ditch, and kept driving. The couple yelled at him to stop and they got out of the cab, and the driver sped away, leaving them on the side of the road.

The girl was complaining of head pain and needed to be transported. The guy had ear pain and then started complaining of neck pain. We only had the two of us on the rig, and since both wanted to go to the hospital, and they both needed to be boarded, I had to call for a second ambulance. We got another one enroute, which left our station with no ambulance and on a general alarm. They got on scene, and all hostility over not getting a scene report was gone. They realized how screwed up it was, got the less critical patient and headed towards the hospital. Good times.

I also did a stand by at a football game. It was absolutely crazy-people everywhere. The people were horrible; they played the national anthem and you couldn't even hear it because people were being so rowdy. And most weren't even watching the game-they were just hanging out in their little groups.

The game was in the next town over, and they tend to have a lot of gang related problems which have just gotten worse with a huge influx of people from Louisiana and from Chicago when a bunch of the projects shut down. There was one big fight that ended with several people being kicked out. Other than that I just concentrated on watching my back...and the drug box in the rig :)

We didn't have any injuries from the game. Just a kid that hit himself in the head with a baseball bat, cut his eyebrow and wanted a bandaid. Good times.

Psyched

A day full of psychs. For almost the entire day, I just bounced from one hospital to the same psych facility over and over again. We joked that we were the underground railroad for psychs-only we had to take the normal streets.

We took one to Chicago pretty late in the day. She was laughing most of the time and things such as the glove box and the tape on the cabinets.

On the way back from Chicago we acted like complete idiots. We searched, and found, the wierdest radio station and blasted it-with the windows open. Then, when we would pass either a) a car with their windows open, b) a large crowd of people, or c) a semi-truck, we would slow down and start dancing like complete idiots. Think: rave dancers with glow sticks, someone having a seizure, and disco dancing all in one. It was hysterical. By the time we got close to the highway we were playing it over the PA and naming our dance moves, such as "dying octopus" "crazed orangutan" "drowning fish" and "rabid donkey." It was way too funny. The best was on the highway because we would catch up to a truck, slow down so that we were even with their cab, count to 3 and start dancing. A couple of them were laughing hysterically and then got on their CB radios.

We got back up north and were immediately dispatched to another psych for the underground railroad. I recommended that we just rent a bus and take them all at once, but we couldn't figure out how to secure the restraints properly to the bus seats. Yeah.

We got into the ER and started paperwork. I checked on the patient and let him know I would be right back-we just had to grab the rest of the paperwork. As I was leaving the room I thought I heard something like a duck quacking. I ignored it and started getting everything together. We got him on the cot and out to the rig. While we were pulling out of the bay I heard it again. It was definitely a quack. He continued quacking for the entire trip. By the time we were halfway to the hospital we were playing a game I like to call "animal sounds." He would quack, I would bark, he'd quack again, I would moo, or meow, or make any other sound I could think of. He was having a blast, although he wouldn't make any other noises but the quacking. It was fun just the same.

We were called for a chest pain. We went enroute to the facility our dispatch told us over the nextel. It was about 0300. I didn't bother to look at the pager. We were about 4 blocks away and I look at the pager to see what room number we were going to and the facility name was different. They both start with the same letter. I was like, oh shit! Yeah, so I turned around and headed towards the other one, which is about 2 blocks from our quarters versus the three miles I had just driven. Just as I was making a u turn dispatch keyed us up and told us that we were going the wrong way and that we could disregard. The other shift rig was given the call first, disregarded from it when we got it, and saw us going south instead of east. They got the call. Oops. We went to the facility anyways and helped them out. The lady was fine. She has chronic angina. Like, daily. Oh well.

A very long day, although interesting, I am pooped. I didn't use any ALS skills, but I did have fun dancing, playing animal sounds and going the wrong way on a priority :)

Tequila

Did an unresponsive with a probable subdural and a fall with leg pain...

Then a couple of ALS calls for lets see...fever, fever, ALS request but no ALS skills....yeah.

I actually got away without doing any psychs today, which is extremely unusual.

We ran most of the day. Mostly south of my area. 

Our last call was for chest pain. It was at an acute care clinic (that really isn't even open anymore) for a 40-something guy with chest pain. He actually looked like he was in pain. Once we got him in the rig he said, "Good." He didn't speak much English, but we had just given him a nitro, so I assume it worked. He actually started talking in broken English on the way to the hospital. He was laughing a lot, and then he kept saying, "No more tequila, no more margaritas for me." In his Spanish accent. It was pretty funny. We were all laughing by the time we were walking into the ER. He was quite funny, in that drunk-disruptive kind of way. At least he was a happy drunk. The staff at the ER even got a kick out of him.

Good times.

Shocked

First call of the day was for a 35 y/o man that got electrocuted. We were called to an occupational health clinic to pick him up. The guy said he was working and hit a live wire that was hooked up to a transformer. The wire carries 100,000 volts of electricity. His partner unplugged his hedge trimmer, which he couldn't let go of because of the electricity. He goes to his boss and tells him what happens. His boss tells him to drive himself up to occ health and take a whiz quiz. So, he does. In the mean time, he has chest pain, dizziness, pain in his arm, etc. He drove almost 25 miles to get to the clinic, sat in the clinic for over an hour before they decided to call us, and then we had to take him. He was still clammy and looked like crap when we took him. That's going to be a nice lawsuit.

We did a priority for shortness of breath, only to find out once we were on scene that they lady was not short of breath, and had no complaints. The RN said she had crackles in her lungs. They were clear and diminished at the bases. She was fine.

We did a BLS return to a nursing home s/p hip fracture.

An ALS transfer for cardiac surgery.

Another priority for hypertension and kidney stones. The lady just screamed the entire time and was actually hypotensive. Nice. By the time we got to the hospital I was screaming with her. (I was driving). I think she actually got a kick out of it. 

We just got cancelled off of a chest pain that walked out of a clinic. Hopefully the night won't be too bad :)

Road Trip

I finally broke down and did it. I made a road trip to Michigan to visit my best friend from high school. It was only about 215 miles; about 2 1/2 hours to get here. Not too shabby. I am having the time of my life so far. We have lots of catching up to do. I did run into a guy from AMR ambulance and they make much more here than I do in Chicago...hmph.

Lost

Another day full of psychs. The only one that really sticks out in my mind was in the afternoon. We were taking her back to a nursing facility. We got to the hospital, and when I checked the room she was supposed to be in, it was empty. One of the docs asked if she could help us with something (unusual, I know) and I asked her if she knew where our patient was. She said that she saw her wandering in the halls for the past couple of hours, and she would look for her. Yeah...she found her. 2 blocks from the hospital! The cops brought her back in and we had an uneventful trip to the nursing facility. Good times.

Recovery

Today was my day of recovery. Well, it should have been. I thought I would be sick, after last night, but I was actually good to go. I was a lazy bum for most of the day. I worked in the evening. Nothing too good; a 2 year old with trouble breathing and a woman with numbness in her arm.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today is my birthday. I hung out with some friends and had dinner with my mom during the day. Then I went out clubbing with some girls from work. We had an absolute blast. You only turn 21 once you know....

Dazed and Confused

Today was a bit of an odd day. When I got to work I learned that my normal partner had taken a personal day and I was working with someone else. Not a big deal, just different. Sunday is usually a hit or miss day. Either we are extremely busy or we sleep all day. Today was busy.

Our first call was a priority out of a home address for dizziness. We got on scene in a ritzy area and headed inside. The lady was downstairs in the basement. She had woken up feeling dizzy around 0630 and it still hadn't gone away. No biggie, right? We got the stair chair and headed back down to get her out to the rig. We were getting ready to move her over, and her son points to the stair chair and was like, "Um...isn't that supposed to be connected to something?" I looked and sure enough, part of the chair had come undone and one of the front legs wasn't connected to the seat. Great. Then, after moving her over, I go to pup one of the straps across her chest and the seatbelt clip came off. Needless to say, I couldn't get it back on, and we had to tie the straps together. This was quite embarassing, especially because of the standards of living in that area. We got her out to the rig and onto the stretcher. We did all of our care, and headed towards the hospital. I was chatting with the patient and an IV bag came flying out of the cabinet and fell on her shoulder. It didn't hurt her, but all I could do was repeatedly apologize. (I could have sworn that I closed that cabinet!). The ride was bumpy, and I was just waiting for something else to go wrong.

We cleared up from there and were sent on a priority for severe abdominal pain. Of course, the lady weighed almost 400 pounds and was about 5 feet tall. She stated 10/10 pain and that she had a history of gall stones. She looked like she was in pain. It took forever to get her out to the rig, but we finally made it. Her vitals were stable. She writhed and screamed in pain when I started the IV, so I began to think that she had an extremely low pain tolerance. She stated she only wanted to go to one hospital. It wasn't the closest, but the second closest, so I told her that we would talk to medical control and find out what we were going to do. I was on the phone with tele and I told them that, "....hospital is the closest with an ETA of 9 minutes, we have an ETA to your facility of 17." The patient yelled, I will not go to that other hospital, I only want to go to ...hospital. The RN on tele asked me to get another pain rating, and the patient said it was down to a 2. They allowed the longer transport. I think the lady only said that so that she could go to the hospital she wanted, but in the process, downgraded it to no lights/sirens. Oh well.

We did a kid with a ruptured spleen to a Children's hospital. And a few BLS calls.

Blistering Hot

Today has been ridiculously hot. And the heat is here to stay for a while. When I got up this morning around 0730 to go to church, it wasn't too bad. The radio said it was 90 degrees. I can deal with that.

By the time I was heading back to the firehouse for my shift at 1200, it was 98 degrees with a heat index of 105. I was sweating buckets.

It is odd how the weather works here, because it always feels much warmer in the evening. It was 100 degrees at 1600 with a heat index of 108. It was so hot and humid it was hard to breathe. I felt like I was sucking air through a straw. 

Tomorrow is supposed to be worse. 99 by 1000. That means over 100 by the afternoon. And, of course, I am working at the ambulance company where I get to wear wonderful polyester. Yeah. I won't be surprised if our crews drop like flies. 

No calls so far today. I'm sure we'll have something tonight.

Sorry

I haven't had much time to post recently. I am keeping track of my calls and stuff for the most part. I have been journaling in a notebook, so bear with me.

Angel of Death

First call was for a person with shortness of breath. We got on scene and the nursing home forgot to mention that he was normally A+Ox1 and combative and now he isn't. He was extremely lethargic. His blood pressure was pretty low. He was breathing erratically. Great. And they though we were going to transport to a hospital 13 miles away. Ha.

We got him loaded in the ambulance, did our normal routine, and headed towards the hospital (the closest). His SPO2 was about 94% on a NRB. I can deal with that. Unfortunately, they didn't stay that way. We were about 4 blocks from the hospital when he started to circle the drain. His sats dropped steadily- 88....82....79....76...71...yeah. Fantastic. I ended up having to bag him the rest of the way, and his sats would still only raise into the 80s. He had no history of cardiac or respiratory problems, and he was a full code. I called the hospital when we were about a block away with an update. It was a good call though. I was surprised that he hadn't coded yet when we left the ER.

Next call was a burn and return. (Radiation therapy). It was a BLS call, which should have been easy. Not today. The guy had lung cancer that was pretty advanced. His vitals were stable when we took them on the floor. We headed towards the clinic where he gets radiation and my partner asked me to pull over. His blood pressure had dropped to 80 systolic. We took it again and got about the same number. We called tele and told them what was going on. They just had us access his pic line and give him a fluid challenge. It worked. We continued on our way. His pressure continued to fluctuate while we had him. I think we gave him about 500cc of fluid. 

We did a psych transport for a teen with depression. She was a real piece of work.

Next call was for a possible CVA. The nursing home was 20 miles away. These are the calls that I wonder why the nurse didn't just call 911. We figured out why when we got there. The guy had facial drooping and weakness. It started two days ago. Nice. His blood pressure was low, he was minimally responsive, and had all the signs of a CVA. No clot busters for him.

We also did an ALS transfer for a lady with swelling that had gastric bypass in the beginning of July, and is now swollen and leaking excessive fluid from the drains in her abdomen. We took her all the way to Chicago. I think we got back to quarters around 0430. Grrr.

A busy shift. I actually felt like a medic for once, and not a taxi driver.

Ka-BOOM

Sorry! It seems like I fell off the earth, but I'm still here. I'm busy as ever and I haven't had time to post. I still don't have internet access except at work, so bear with me.

Nothing too good recently. I missed going on a huge fire by 5 minutes :(

Today is Independence Day. Not so fun when you're at work. I started at 1700. No picnic...no good fireworks....

I did get to see some fireworks. I contemplated climbing to the roof of the hose tower...actually I made it to the roof of the hose tower. Only nobody else was dumb enough to follow. I came back down before the fireworks even started. I figured my chief wouldn't be too happy if I fell off :) One of the guys got a picture on his phone. I look like cat-woman because you can barely see the little ladder. You have to climb up the ladder in the hose tower to the landing, then open the window and climb a skinny little ladder on the outside of the building to the top. Yeah...

We ended up sitting in the parking lot of a gas station where we could catch glimpses of the fireworks from the town south of us. Not so fun.

A guy stopped in and told us he had something to turn over. It was a huge stick of something...dynamite...I don't know. I had to call around and nobody knew what to do with it. I was going to just blow it up, but I decided I liked having all 10 of my fingers.

We actually weighed it at the police station. I guess anything over 28 grams is a felony. This one weighed in at 35.3.

Anyways, I will post more soon I hope. I am working crazy hours to try and get my house finished. And of course, save up for another vacation.

I missed the big one today. I ended up sitting at the station twiddling my thumbs while everyone else was out having fun. They came back three hours later. I got to clean the rig. I spent the morning cleaning. That was about it.

I can't wait for August. Well, I guess I can. Because after August comes September and then winter. Yuck. I wish we had this weather all year long.

Life is crazy. All I do is work. Literally. I got job to job, with maybe a couple of hours in between if I am lucky. I guess it's all right though. I want to go on vacation in August, so I better start saving.

Some days I feel like I am stuck in a vacuum. Nothing seems to change. I do the same things over and over again. Maybe I am in the making of the movie "Groundhog Day II." Something has got to give.

Fall

We did back to back calls for falls. One was legitimate...I guess. She ended up getting admitted because she couldn't remember falling. She had a 1/2" laceration on her head. No biggie. Our second fall was for a lady that slid out of bed. She was A+Ox2-3, so we had to take her in. The facility wasn't going to send her. I guess our patient had slid out of bed trying to get a better light for reading at 0530, and didn't call anybody. She was still sitting on the floor reading her book at 1000. I guess it was a good book. Anyways, her family wanted her checked out. I took her back to the nursing home several hours later.

We did a psych transport. A transport for a lady who's doctor was at a different hospital.

And a chest pain at 0630 (I get off at 0700 grrr). Just the typical chest pain. Nothing great. We hauled butt and got off by 0730.

I was hoping to work outside today, but it is raining. Oh well...

Bloody Mess

I got called for a head injury. The guy had blood everywhere. We cleaned him up and it was a 1/2 cm cut. Wow. I guess that's what alcohol and head wounds do. Anyways, he didn't want to go, and he signed AMA.

Another AMA for a guy that was supposedly unconscious, but states that he is just hot. Nice.

Another day. Just another day. It is hot and humid. Looks like it's going to rain. I could go for a good storm. Something to watch anyways.

I wish I was back in Maryland. I had such a good time there. And the people were unbelievable. Oh well. I guess I have to take what I can get. Maybe I'll do some homework. 

The monotony of my life is slowly killing me.

Laceration

We got called for a child with a laceration. He had been riding his bike at the skate park and fell. His sunglasses caught him right above his eyebrow. A nice deep 3 cm laceration. We cleaned him up, got ahold of his parents and waited. His parents were at a friend's house, but got there in about 5 minutes. They wanted to take him to a hospital out of our district. They signed him AMA and that was that.

No other calls yet. I'm bored out of my mind. Hopefully we get something good tonight :)

Greasy Spoon

A few BLS calls back to back. Then a priority call for a woman with abdominal distention. She wasn't in any pain, but her belly was hard as a rock and made her look 9 months pregnant. She had a history of bowel obstructions.

A psych transfer to a state mental facility for a woman with psychosis. I've had her before. She didn't like me the first time, and she really didn't like me today. It was a long 65 mile trip.

Another BLS return.

Last call was for a 55 y/o man that was burned by hot grease. I didn't get the whole story but he was frying chicken at a restaurant. He had first and second degree burns from his chin to his belt line. His arms and hands were probably the worst. We took him to the burn center. We didn't even take him to his room (in the ICU). He went directly to the washdown where they clean and remove all the dead tissue. The weird part was that it didn't smell like burned flesh. It just smelled like grease. Yuck.

We didn't get back to quarters until almost 0500. A very long shift.

Sluggish

Back at the ambulance company today. I have been terrible with keeping up with my blog. Sorry! 

We haven't done too much today. All BLS calls. Nothing good. I am doing some public education tomorrow so that should be fun.

Hopefully more excitement soon!

Back from NFA

I have more stuff to post, I just don't have the time right now. The academy was great. I made some really good friends, and met some really cool people. The class was awesome-as I expected, but my classmates were the best part. I had people in my class from all over the U.S. Some of us already have plans to vacation by each other. Me and a friend from Idaho are already planning a trip to Hawaii in the spring to visit two other guys from my class. Good times.

When we left it felt like summer camp all over again. Very sad. I felt like I was losing my best friends. We all plan to keep in touch though. Spring will come soon...

Fire Prevention

I just arrived in Emmitsburg, MD. Well, yesterday anyways. Good times. I am having the time of my life. It is so wierd to be away from work. When the alarm clock went off this morning I thought it was my pager and came flying out of bed. When I actually came to I realized that I wasn't at the firehouse.

My class is going to be really good. We have tons of outside activities. We even have graduation! We are taking a class trip to Gettysburg to visit, and if I can convince a couple others, maybe DC. We shall see.

I was told how wonderful it is here, but I know now that it is definitely the truth. This place is awesome. Everybody treats you like an equal. Even the security officers are nice.

We are right across the street from Camp David. When the president comes in, the blackhawk helicopters land here. That's pretty cool.

Anyways, I will have more blogs from this week and a couple backdated ones. I haven't had time to keep up.

NFA

I'm finally out at the National Fire Academy. We left yesterday around 1030 am. Yeah! We had check in as soon as we got on campus (after an hour and a half long bus ride from Baltimore/DC airport), then it was time for some fun. We had dinner, then went out drinking. A couple of us walked the mile or so to "town." Which is actually only about a mile long strip. A one stoplight town. We ended up at a hole in the wall bar, but it was a really good time.

I started class this morning. The class I am in focuses on community fire prevention. I think it is going to be a really good class. There are people from all over the U.S. here. Five people came from my department. We are all in different classes, so we only see each other for breakfast, dinner, and night time fun :). Lunch we spend with others from our class because lunch times may differ depending on what you are doing in class that day. 

I have already learned a lot that I plan on bringing back to my community. It is interesting to hear about how other departments around the nation are run. I thought we were a very small department, but I learned today that we are really lucky. We may be small, but we have neighboring departments that we have mutual aid agreements with that we work with all the time. They can be to our city within five minutes or so. Some of the people I talked to said they would have to wait at least a half hour. Wow. 

I have more blogs to post that are currently on paper. I just haven't had the time. I would do it now but I think I had a few too many tonight if you know what I mean. I apologize in advance for this blog because it probably makes absolutely no sense. :)

God bless and good night.

Phantom of the Elevator

Several calls today. Good times. We had a smoke investigation. A deck caught on fire. A neighbor put it out. It was still fun. We also did an elevator rescue that turned out to be nothing. We joked that it was the phantom in the elevator. There was nobody there and the students needed to get a key from the office to use it. Oh well. At least we got the keys figured out so that if there is a real emergency we can act more efficiently. We also had a dumpster fire. Lots of fun. The paint was completely melted off and the lid was burned off. The water was boiling off the metal. It was almost a real fire. I hope I get a real one soon :).

...Psycho

I spent most of the day today in the city. Good times. We did a psych from up north to the city. The woman seemed okay. She was hearing voices. I got about a quarter of the way to Chicago and all hell broke loose.

I was on the highway and I heard a ruckus in the back. My partner was struggling to get the seatbelts back on our patient. I was on the highway, and I had to pull the ambulance over, turn the lights on, get out of the rig and get in back. We got her in restraints and we were back on our way. Whew. She said that the voices were telling her to get out of the ambulance.

Dispatch sent us hot to a professional building in the city for a woman having difficulty breathing. We got on scene, up to the floor, and my dispatch called us and said, "don't go on the floor!" Okay, well now that we're up here. We never found out why we were cancelled.

We got a call right after that for a five year old with a femur fracture. He supposedly tripped and fell while running at the playground. Yeah, not quite believable. We had to put him in hare traction for transport to the Children's hospital.

Another day. The countdown begins for vacation!

Even Better

One good call. We were called for a man who took the wrong medication. When we got on scene, our patient was very agitated, and said he was going crazy. He had taken the wrong meds. Not his fault though; the pharmacy gave him the wrong ones. He had been taking them for four days, and obviously, not taking the meds he should have been. They gave him clomiphene instead of clomipramine. Yeah. Clomiphene is a drug some women take to increase fertility, etc. Not really for men to take. The calls just keep getting better. First a leaky testicle, now a guy that will probably grow ovaries... :). What next?

Fall

We did back to back calls for falls. One was legitimate...I guess. She ended up getting admitted because she couldn't remember falling. She had a 1/2" laceration on her head. No biggie. Our second fall was for a lady that slid out of bed. She was A+Ox2-3, so we had to take her in. The facility wasn't going to send her. I guess our patient had slid out of bed trying to get a better light for reading at 0530, and didn't call anybody. She was still sitting on the floor reading her book at 1000. I guess it was a good book. Anyways, her family wanted her checked out. I took her back to the nursing home several hours later.

We did a psych transport. A transport for a lady who's doctor was at a different hospital.

And a chest pain at 0630 (I get off at 0700 grrr). Just the typical chest pain. Nothing great. We hauled butt and got off by 0730.

I was hoping to work outside today, but it is raining. Oh well...

Urine

I worked 0800 until about 1400. One call for a man with urine leaking from his testicle. Very weird call. I guess it's possible, but as far as I know-unusual. All I could think about was the human anatomy and I couldn't figure out how it was possible. But, there was, in fact, a hole (small) in the man's testicle with fluid leaking out-and the room smelled like urine. Even the doctor at the ER had never heard of it. It had been going on for 6 days. I don't know if it's just me, but if I had urine leaking out of my testicle, I wouldn't wait 6 days to figure out why.

I caught a "structure fire" today responding from home. It was just room and contents. If we had been two minutes later, it would have been a good one. I was just excited to get a fire.

I figure this: since I have been "official," I got one supposed structure fire mutual aid that we got on scene-went to staging, and never got out of the rig. This one was #2, and I actually made it on scene, packed up, with my axe in hand, and (almost) did some work. Granted, all I got to do was carry and set up a ventilation fan and repack hose, it was still a step closer to the real thing.

I was absolutely psyched to finally be on a fire scene :) It was that much better without having "recruit" plastered across my helmet. Yeah for me!

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.