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Great Time to Get Involved With NAEMT
It’s election time at NAEMT. Voting ends October 28, so this is a perfect time to join the largest organization representing the interests of EMS practitioners. Like many people, I joined several...
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An “Each Question May Be Your Last” Respiratory Assessment
I remember the first really bad respiratory patient I went on as an EMT about 12 years ago. A 40-year-old employee at a Target store had has an asthma attack around midnight. She was in a tripod...
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EMS Family Resources Needs Your Help
I’ve been meaning to write a post about EMS Family Resources for some time. I learned about this organization last March at EMS Today. It was started after Justin Conklin, a 32-year-old paramedic...
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Safe Spinal Clearance Equals Better Care For Spinal Injuries: Part 1
Dave Ross is at it again on EMS 1 about spinal immobilization. In his previous column, Confessions of Recovering Field Spine Clearance Addict, he describes problems with implementing a C-spine...
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Safe Spinal Clearance Equals Better Care For Spinal Injuries: Part 2
In Part 1, I described why I believe EMS providers should have the same knowledge base that physician’s assistants do. This would improve our ability to detect partial spinal cord injuries, and to...
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Longevity in EMS
Yesterday I caught EMS Educast episode 148, where Greg Friese, Bill Toon, and Rob Theriault discussed ways to prepare students for a long career in EMS with their guest Lori Sizer. I was a guest on...
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EMS Psych Calls: An Area To Specialize?
Last Sunday I was able to join a discussion about psychiatric patients on EMS Office Hours. A number of complicated issues came up, and many of them have no established best practices. This is a...
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Verbal Deescalation
Ma’am, you’ve cut your arm very badly. I understand that you don’t want anyone to help you, but someone cares enough about you to call for help. Now you have six people working very hard to take care...
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Newtown
Most of my posts share experiences or topics I’ve researched. My goal with each one is to teach and stimulate discussion. I have nothing in those areas to offer about Newtown. I have nothing of...
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For EMS’ers, Is PA School Just the Next Thing to Do?
“Why do most people get married?” asked my young, “cool” religion teacher at my Catholic high school about 20 years ago. After a few answers about finding love and soul mates, he shook his head no....
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Book Review: You Called 911 For What?
I recently had the pleasure of reading Dave Konig’s ebook You Called 911 For What? It is a mix of history about the 911 system, humorous dialog between 911 callers and operators, and a little bit...
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Let’s All Call Out Sick New Year’s Eve! That’ll Show ‘em.
The EMS system in our nation’s capital kicked off 2013 with more bad headlines. This is from EMS1: A D.C. man died while waiting for an ambulance amidst a city-wide staff shortage when more than 100...
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Advancing My Education
Forgive me Blogfather, for I have sinned. It’s been over a month since my last post. I know you don’t like excuses, but the class I’m taking this semester is kicking my ass. There are lots of things...
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Somewhere Between 8 Minutes and Whenever We Get There: That’s Our Problem
My friend and recently new coworker Scott “Medic SBK” Keir wrote about a pseudo-controversy from where he used to work about long response times. In AMR’s contract with Springfield, MA, they must...
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Who Will the Community Paramedics Be?
Last week I was in Washington DC for EMS on the Hill Day. Unfortunately the meetings with our representatives were cancelled because a predicted but unrealized snow storm. NAEMT anticipated that the...
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In Ft. Worth, MedStar Treated My Aunt the Way I Would Treat a Family Member
I got a phone call from my aunt who lives in Ft. Worth about a month ago. She had fallen and injured her shoulder, and was in a tremendous amount of pain after. She told me how wonderful the...
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Why EMS Applicant Screening Matters
One of my soap boxes is that EMS needs to do a better job of picking people for the tremendous responsibility we have. How many other professions place people alone with some of society’s most...
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Less of That, More of This
Over at EMS 1, ambulance driving expert Kelly Grayson wrote an excellent column about how he became a “stand back, big picture, non-interventional paramedic.” He describes how he would manage a...
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Narc Policies that Make it Hard to Do the Right Thing
Several ALS procedures, such as intubation, IV fluids for trauma, and ACLS drugs have not been proven to make a difference or have been shown to cause harm. Pain management, however, is one...
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A Musician’s Approach to Airway Management
Since age 10, I’ve had an on-again, off-again relationship with the guitar. It started with weekly lessons at a music store, where I learned how to play simple scales and chords. About 10 years ago...
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