KrazyRabidSheep
12th September 2009, 17:50
As some of you may know, I am an EMT, or Emergency Medical Technician working in St. Louis, MO, U.S.
As the poor sucker who works for an ambulance serving a metropolitan area of almost 3 million people, I've seen a couple things that have made me upset.
The other day, however, topped it all.
Anybody who has a medical background may already know somewhat where I'm heading after reading the thread title. Others may have looked up wikipedia or whatever after seeing strange words. For the rest, let me explain.
We were dispatched to a call in the city. It came out as a 324, which is our 10-code for "bleeding, active" (as opposed to a 374 "bleeding, controlled").
We've got plenty of calls that we know are B.S. as soon as they are dispatched. However, uncontrolled bleeding can be a problem. Especially if the patient takes certain commonly Rx meds such as heparin or coumadin.
We get to the scene, after running lights and sirens, and what do we find?
A grown adult with a nose bleed. Okay, fine, but after our interview, what was the cause of this nose bleed? Picking their nose. Great.
We couldn't convince this rather annoying person, who had no known cardiovascular problems, to sign our refusal form, so we had to (by law) transport to the ER of their choice.
I had the nosebleed stopped enroute.
By the way, "epistaxis due to digital trauma" was part if the radio report I gave to the facility we were transporting to.
As the poor sucker who works for an ambulance serving a metropolitan area of almost 3 million people, I've seen a couple things that have made me upset.
The other day, however, topped it all.
Anybody who has a medical background may already know somewhat where I'm heading after reading the thread title. Others may have looked up wikipedia or whatever after seeing strange words. For the rest, let me explain.
We were dispatched to a call in the city. It came out as a 324, which is our 10-code for "bleeding, active" (as opposed to a 374 "bleeding, controlled").
We've got plenty of calls that we know are B.S. as soon as they are dispatched. However, uncontrolled bleeding can be a problem. Especially if the patient takes certain commonly Rx meds such as heparin or coumadin.
We get to the scene, after running lights and sirens, and what do we find?
A grown adult with a nose bleed. Okay, fine, but after our interview, what was the cause of this nose bleed? Picking their nose. Great.
We couldn't convince this rather annoying person, who had no known cardiovascular problems, to sign our refusal form, so we had to (by law) transport to the ER of their choice.
I had the nosebleed stopped enroute.
By the way, "epistaxis due to digital trauma" was part if the radio report I gave to the facility we were transporting to.