Thursday, May 22, 2008

The Mixed Bag - Another Installment

So far tonight I've dealt with two collisions resulting in three refusals and one transport - a 16 year-old, restrained, rear ended at a stop sign. Not much damage to the Mercedes-Benz that hit his Toyota Corolla, but the rear end of his car was pretty well FUBAR'd. He had neck pain, but otherwise he was okay.

Got called for a couple in a car with the passenger having difficulty breathing. The person driving the car got disoriented as she didn't know where she was. It took a bit to find them, but the car was probably 400 feet away from where we were sent. When we found them, she was attempting CPR on her husband. He'd come to a sudden stop. He had what she described as a seizure, then he stopped breathing. Cardiac history including bypass surgery in 1989 and a history of diabetes. Not sure what else he had going on, and we didn't stick around to find out. As soon as we arrived - we had an engine company get there at about the same time as us - we got him out of the car and got started working on him. CPR immediately, we loaded him aboard the ambulance and got him on the monitor. It showed V-Fib - we got the first shock in, changed him into asystole. Re-started CPR, got the ACLS algorithm going. Intubated the patient - successfully, for the first time in quite a while, I'm happy to say. We got IV access and started pushing drugs. Overall he got three rounds of Epi, three rounds of Atropine, and a total of four shocks as we rolled into the ED. Once he was inside, they worked him for another 30 minutes with no changes. It was called at that point.

I felt especially bad for his wife; she did what she could, and from what she told us it was pretty sudden. And we did everything we were supposed to.

About an hour afterward, we got called for an unknown medical problem a few minutes south of the hospital. As it was, we had been following a car that was really erratic, and while we were behind her, a number of Manchester's finest showed up to close in on this car. Once they got the car stopped, we met up with them. It was the driver of this same vehicle, a 62 year-old female with a blood glucose of 29mg/dl. The cops thought she'd been drinking, and if you didn't know what hypoglycemia looked like you'd think so, too. Well, we treated her on scene and transported her to the hospital.

I'm working with someone I've never worked with prior to tonight. She's an EMT-Intermediate that I'd been told about, but I didn't quite know what to expect. It turns out that I'm dealing with someone who is as slow as I am fast, when it comes down to work. It's driving me crazy; I feel like I'm dragging around a toddler, and it's not making me feel particularly safe. Hopefully I won't go out again during the shift, but I'm inclined to think that I shouldn't be so wishful. But we'll see.

2 comments:

EE said...

"It turns out that I'm dealing with someone who is as slow as I am fast, when it comes down to work. It's driving me crazy; I feel like I'm dragging around a toddler, and it's not making me feel particularly safe."

Ditto on my partner. I feel ya on this one!

EE said...

Also, I see you joined whereistand.com, it's addicting!