Friday, August 5, 2011
A question for everyone.
I was asked to ask everyone this question sent to me via email (mad_medix@yahoo.com). "What's the best prank you've played or seen played on a co-worker?"
Thursday, August 4, 2011
A question for all EMTs
Vegas Medic who is a friend of mine on facebook (my email address on FB is mad_medix@yahoo.com for anyone who wants to add me) sent me this question. "How do you protect yourself and your partner in these dangerous times?" Any comments/suggestions?
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Guess who will be starting your foley!
I am sitting in the lobby. This place is utterly packed. People getting annoyed that they are not being called back soon. I have my computer chair as low as it will go in hopes that fewer people can see me that way. I get annoyed when they repeatedly come to ask me how much longer it will be. My answer was "I don't know" last time you asked; it will be the same this time. It is around 0200 in the am. I have my hair up in a new-age fohawk style. Just when a local police officer brings in this young male for drug testing. The very first thing he says when he walks up to my desk is "your hair is gay!" I reply with "your hair is gay. I'm gay what's your excuse?" At this point the lobby hushes to pay attention to our conversation. He shoots back "YOU'RE A FUCKING FAGGOT?!" My response "no I'm gay not a faggot." "YOUR A FUCKING FAGGOT?!" says he. At this point the police officer takes him back to the triage room as to separate us. I feel the blood has rushed to my face and I know I am instantly red. My registration girls call me as having heard the scuffle. "Are you okay?" "Yes I'm fine, I don't let that stuff get me down." They tell me that they love me knowing I really am upset. I assure them that I will be fine, just need to calm down. The rest of the patients leave me alone for the remainder of their wait. I walk in to the triage area to take back some paperwork. The minute young male sees me he fires off "Faggot!" The police officer shoves his head into the wall and I return to my desk. I later walk to the nurses station (everyone has heard what has happened by this time) The Dr. tells me we will need to collect some urine to do his drug testing. I tell him good luck with that knowing that he would not give it willingly. He tells me if he does not I could start his foley while PD and security restrain him. Oh happy day for me haha. I explain to PD that we need urine and if he does not give it I will be starting a foley on him at which they smile. He of course hears this and willingly gives us urine. Damn the luck!!
Monday, July 25, 2011
Is this the place where you get your penis chopped off?
Well it is 0500, just two hours until I go home. Here I am a little worried that I will not have any patients exciting enough to write about tonight. I was starting to think of writing of one of my past experiences just to put on here to have something for you guys to read when lo and behold mankind pulled through once again and gave me material! I am sitting in the ER lobby just checking patients in when this man stumbles into the lobby. He staggers his way up to my desk reaking of ETOH. He then slurrs the question "Is this the place where you can get your penis cut off?" After working to keep my 'pokerface' in front of the other patients, ask I "why do you want to do that?" He replies "I'm tired of being acused of cheating and raping women. I think just cutting it off would make it to where they can't do that." After thinking of what to do, I call my charge nurse and ask him to come to the lobby. He comes out and explains to the guy that we do not do that procedure in an emergency room. I then give him a list of primary doctors for him to call and be referred to a surgeon. Just when I think the night is going to be boring I have a request I have never had! Never would have even thought I would! I love my job! It's definately gives me great stories to share with the world!!
I'm from Pluto!
Well last night was certainly exciting! When I arrived to work, the street was lined with ambulances dumping all the lovely patients off on us. Of course our lobby was balls to walls! There was just about no chairs left for people to sit down in. We had very sick patients, yes it was one of those nights were not only were we busy, but we were busy with many traumas, ICUs and just sick sick people! One of our patients that was brought in by ambulance was covered in fecal matter, was crazy in general and stunk. She had poo coated all over her hands, her pants was full of green muschy shit and it was all down in her pant legs. Of course she was my patient, so I had the joy of getting her all hooked up to cardiac monitors, blood pressure cuffs, doing the EKG and other things we do upon arrival. And then the nurse said the impending words of doom that I knew was coming! She is going to need a shower Jake! So my co-worker and I stripped her of her clothes, put them in a bio bag and shoved her in the shower. My co worker stayed in there with her and did the main bathing part, for that I am grateful! Then several nasty, crazy, rude patients later, we had this woman come in by ambulance. She was there for psychosis. She was from the planet Pluto, and hated anyone from the planet Earth. She started cussing all of us before she even got off the cot it the hallway. She was taken to her room where she continued her rudness. She kept walking down the hall and yelling at everyone who crossed her path. She said some very rude things to our unit secretery. She kept telling us that she went across seas for our fat asses. She then was esscorted outside by our security whom she felt the need to get in their faces and threaten with a pencil! She then went across the street where we smoke and asked all of our employees for cigarettes. When everyone denied her based on our policy that don't allow us to give cigarettes out to patients; she then began screaming at the top of her lungs "this is why no one likes coming to this hospital, because all of you guys have attitudes!" She then went back inside where she continued screaming down the hallways and cursing at everyone and eventually calmed down when we gave her medicine. In any event, we had a lovely and exciting evening!! Oh also a young boy had his face blown off from a firework explosion, SAD!
Have you driven an ambulance before?
My partner and I had been running emergency calls back to back for the previous twelve hours. We had just dropped our last patient off at the Emergency Room and knew there was more calls pending.
I still had twelve hours to go on a twenty-four hour shift, but my partner was two hours past the end of his shift. Emergency calls always trump swinging by the ambulance quarters to drop off someone at the end of their shift and pickup a fresh partner.
You get off when you get off. It took my wife a couple of years to get used to this.
My partner radioed dispatch and said he absolutely had to get off duty immediately to rush home because his grandmother, who suffers from pyromania, was having labor pains and had just called him to say that her water had broken. Luckily, it had put out the fire she started in the living room.
He threatened that if he wasn’t relieved immediately, then whatever else happened at his house would be on the shift supervisor’s head.
The dispatcher called his bluff and radioed that she was sending another ambulance and a fire engine to his house to make sure his poor pregnant pyromaniac grandmother was OK.
My partner snarled like a dog at the radio while thinking of something to say into the microphone. The dispatcher broke the silence and said his relief would meet us at the hospital emergency room in a few minutes. We could hear laughing in the background.
My partner was so happy he literally bounced out of the drivers seat just as his relief walked up. Without a word to anyone he just started running.
I was sitting in the passenger seat trying to catch up on paperwork and enjoy a cigarette. I yelled, “Where are you going? You don’t have a car here.” I saw him in the side mirror running away and heard a faint, “I don’t care.”
I didn’t have time to worry about him. I picked up the microphone and radioed, “Two-Eight’s in-service.”
Right on cue the dispatcher came back with, “10-4, respond to a three car MVA, multiple injuries at….”
My new partner was an EMT that I had never worked with before. In fact, I didn’t know anything about him except his name. He heard the call and asked, “Mind if I drive?”
I’m kind of a control freak and prefer to drive to calls unless I’ve worked with a partner for a while, but I was tired and said, “Sure, let’s go.”
He almost whooped with joy and jumped behind the wheel. Somewhere in the bottom of my mind the thought flashed that his reaction should concern me, but I pushed it aside.
We pulled out into traffic and he turned on our lights and siren. He didn’t accelerate at all and we traveled half a block at ten miles an hour.
First of all, this looks stupid and it’s embarrassing when people are walking beside the ambulance staring at you and covering their ears.
I looked at him hard and said, “Let’s fucking go.” With that, he punched the gas and we took off like a shot.
I stared at him for a second. He had the weirdest look on his face; part orgasm and part scared shitless. I also noted his body language. It wasn’t at all like how people who drive emergency vehicles for a living look.
He reminded me of one of those miniature wood manikins that artists use to show different anatomical positions. He looked like someone had bent his body into a stiff and unnatural sitting position with a wire stand sticking up his ass.
My finely honed skill of what EMS workers call “taking in the big picture” kicked in.
It consists of recognizing and absorbing many small bits of information, putting them all together and making an instantaneous deduction about what is happening, or what has happened, and what needs to be done.
My sleep-deprived brain started processing information. I saw his white-knuckled death grip on the steering wheel and his foot smashed down on the accelerator like he was having an epileptic grand mal seizure; the intersection filled with cars growing larger through the windshield and the speedometer needle where it shouldn’t be, creeping over to the right side of its arc.
The cars directly in front of us were stopped at a red light and all the lanes were blocked with cars three and four deep. He would have to drive into the oncoming traffic lanes to get through the intersection.
I waited to feel the ambulance begin to drift over to the left hand side of the road but it didn’t. I felt myself shift in my seat with a pang of nervousness.
I like to give my partners the benefit of the doubt that they know their shit and will do things the way I would do things, which is to say, the proper way.
The little voice inside my head that keeps me from getting killed and let’s me know when things just ain’t quite right said, “What the fuck is he doing?”
I agreed with myself and said semi-loud, “You better get over.” He didn’t react so I yelled over the siren, “Get over in the other lane!”
He must have heard me because he jerked the wheel to the left and moved the ambulance into the oncoming traffic lanes.
My body tensed. The little voice spoke up again, “Shouldn’t he be slowing down? Why isn’t he slowing down? Don’t you think he’s going rather fast?”
I couldn’t disagree with myself and I thought, ‘Darn tootin his is.’ I yelled, “Easy man, slow it down.”
I glanced over at my partner and he was staring straight ahead in a trance. This is not the recommended way to safely enter an intersection on the wrong side of the road and against the light.
You better have your head on a swivel and be looking in all directions at once. That ‘Oh shit’ feeling pushed its way up to the front of my consciousness. Suddenly the sound of our accelerating engine sucking air and gas into a wide-open four-barrel carburetor made me think either this guy has a very sick sense of humor or he was going to kill us.
My right foot started pumping the passenger side brake pedal and I screamed, “Slow the fuck down!”
I still had twelve hours to go on a twenty-four hour shift, but my partner was two hours past the end of his shift. Emergency calls always trump swinging by the ambulance quarters to drop off someone at the end of their shift and pickup a fresh partner.
You get off when you get off. It took my wife a couple of years to get used to this.
My partner radioed dispatch and said he absolutely had to get off duty immediately to rush home because his grandmother, who suffers from pyromania, was having labor pains and had just called him to say that her water had broken. Luckily, it had put out the fire she started in the living room.
He threatened that if he wasn’t relieved immediately, then whatever else happened at his house would be on the shift supervisor’s head.
The dispatcher called his bluff and radioed that she was sending another ambulance and a fire engine to his house to make sure his poor pregnant pyromaniac grandmother was OK.
My partner snarled like a dog at the radio while thinking of something to say into the microphone. The dispatcher broke the silence and said his relief would meet us at the hospital emergency room in a few minutes. We could hear laughing in the background.
My partner was so happy he literally bounced out of the drivers seat just as his relief walked up. Without a word to anyone he just started running.
I was sitting in the passenger seat trying to catch up on paperwork and enjoy a cigarette. I yelled, “Where are you going? You don’t have a car here.” I saw him in the side mirror running away and heard a faint, “I don’t care.”
I didn’t have time to worry about him. I picked up the microphone and radioed, “Two-Eight’s in-service.”
Right on cue the dispatcher came back with, “10-4, respond to a three car MVA, multiple injuries at….”
My new partner was an EMT that I had never worked with before. In fact, I didn’t know anything about him except his name. He heard the call and asked, “Mind if I drive?”
I’m kind of a control freak and prefer to drive to calls unless I’ve worked with a partner for a while, but I was tired and said, “Sure, let’s go.”
He almost whooped with joy and jumped behind the wheel. Somewhere in the bottom of my mind the thought flashed that his reaction should concern me, but I pushed it aside.
We pulled out into traffic and he turned on our lights and siren. He didn’t accelerate at all and we traveled half a block at ten miles an hour.
First of all, this looks stupid and it’s embarrassing when people are walking beside the ambulance staring at you and covering their ears.
I looked at him hard and said, “Let’s fucking go.” With that, he punched the gas and we took off like a shot.
I stared at him for a second. He had the weirdest look on his face; part orgasm and part scared shitless. I also noted his body language. It wasn’t at all like how people who drive emergency vehicles for a living look.
He reminded me of one of those miniature wood manikins that artists use to show different anatomical positions. He looked like someone had bent his body into a stiff and unnatural sitting position with a wire stand sticking up his ass.
My finely honed skill of what EMS workers call “taking in the big picture” kicked in.
It consists of recognizing and absorbing many small bits of information, putting them all together and making an instantaneous deduction about what is happening, or what has happened, and what needs to be done.
My sleep-deprived brain started processing information. I saw his white-knuckled death grip on the steering wheel and his foot smashed down on the accelerator like he was having an epileptic grand mal seizure; the intersection filled with cars growing larger through the windshield and the speedometer needle where it shouldn’t be, creeping over to the right side of its arc.
The cars directly in front of us were stopped at a red light and all the lanes were blocked with cars three and four deep. He would have to drive into the oncoming traffic lanes to get through the intersection.
I waited to feel the ambulance begin to drift over to the left hand side of the road but it didn’t. I felt myself shift in my seat with a pang of nervousness.
I like to give my partners the benefit of the doubt that they know their shit and will do things the way I would do things, which is to say, the proper way.
The little voice inside my head that keeps me from getting killed and let’s me know when things just ain’t quite right said, “What the fuck is he doing?”
I agreed with myself and said semi-loud, “You better get over.” He didn’t react so I yelled over the siren, “Get over in the other lane!”
He must have heard me because he jerked the wheel to the left and moved the ambulance into the oncoming traffic lanes.
My body tensed. The little voice spoke up again, “Shouldn’t he be slowing down? Why isn’t he slowing down? Don’t you think he’s going rather fast?”
I couldn’t disagree with myself and I thought, ‘Darn tootin his is.’ I yelled, “Easy man, slow it down.”
I glanced over at my partner and he was staring straight ahead in a trance. This is not the recommended way to safely enter an intersection on the wrong side of the road and against the light.
You better have your head on a swivel and be looking in all directions at once. That ‘Oh shit’ feeling pushed its way up to the front of my consciousness. Suddenly the sound of our accelerating engine sucking air and gas into a wide-open four-barrel carburetor made me think either this guy has a very sick sense of humor or he was going to kill us.
My right foot started pumping the passenger side brake pedal and I screamed, “Slow the fuck down!”
He seemed to come out of his trance for a second, said, “huh?” and took his foot off the accelerator.
My peripheral vision instantly notified my brain that it wasn’t seeing his foot move over to the brake pedal. My brain, multi-tasking its ass off screamed, “What?” Then scrambled a message to my vocal cords and my make-a-wish department. It screamed, “The other pedal, put your foot on the other pedal. Step on the brake you lame-ass sick son-of-bitch mother fucker!”
I scanned the intersection and saw cars speeding in both directions in front of us. It looked like a stampede.
When the cars that were stopped at the red light started flashing past us on my right, my legs went stiff as I pressed both my feet into the imaginary brake pedal.
I started yelling like a Drill Sergeant, “Slow down! Slow fucking down! Slow down now!”
My partner snapped out of it and finally jumped on the brakes. But it was too little, too late. I put my hands on the ceiling and my body went rigid as I stood on my useless brake pedal.
All I could do was brace for impact and scream like a soprano drill sergeant, “Stop, stop, stoooooop!”
My screams of terror were drowned out as we skidded to a tire screaming siren blaring stop. I heard other car tires screeching and waited for the inevitable crash of metal but none came.
I couldn’t see how close we had come to hitting anything because the ambulance was enveloped in a huge cloud of blue smoke from our tires. For 1.8 seconds I felt almost, free of anxiety hiding in the smoke, I couldn’t see them and they couldn’t see me and it was good.
Then our blue cloud floated away we were left looking at a motionless intersection. I immediately went into damage control mode. I reached over and turned off the siren with the idiotic hope that we would suddenly be less noticeable.
Every person in every car was looking at us. I could feel their stares boring into me. I was embarrassed beyond words.
I quickly decided that as long as no one had been hurt and no damage had been done, the best course of action was to feign control of the situation, tuck tail and get the hell out of Dodge.
Through clenched teeth I hissed at the psychotic EMT next to me, “Start the fucking engine, put it in fucking gear and slowly fucking drive forward.” Without a word my ex-partner inched the ambulance through the intersection.
As we slowly passed two cars that had slid to a stop sideways, I ignored the driver’s angry stares and pointed at them, mouthing, “Are you OK?” and making a big OK sign with my fingers.
I knew everyone was ok, at least that’s what I told myself, but I thought I should make a show of concern anyway. However lame it was.
Just to show everybody that we were still on official emergency business, I pushed a button and blasted two or three short “whoop-whoops” on the siren as we left.
As soon as we were a block away I spat, “Pull over.” I was so pissed I couldn’t talk. I blurted, “What, wha, wha, what the, what? Have you ever driven an ambulance before?”
He smiled broadly and beamed with pride, “No, that was my first time.” My head almost exploded when I thought of how close he came to killing me.
I couldn’t think of a bloody thing to say to him except, “We gotta go!” He actually turned in his seat like he was going to drive until I quietly growled, “Get out.” He seemed surprised but pleasantly chirped, “OH, OK.”
My ass had puckered up so far into my abdomen that I had a hard time walking around the front of the ambulance to the driver side.
I stuffed my pucker behind the wheel and sped off toward the three-car accident that actually happened.
We didn’t chitchat much for the rest of the shift. All I knew was that was the closest I ever wanted to come to wrecking an ambulance, killing a bunch of people and not being able to poop for a month.
Having experienced an out of control incident where the only thing I had control of was jack-shit, my control-freak freakishness went pathological. So I’ve been told.
I didn’t see Mario Ass Puckerer for about six months. He turned out to be a really good EMT who didn’t scare his partners.
For those who haven’t done it, running a red light driving on the wrong side of the road is extremely dangerous. It takes teamwork, communication and a partner you trust to do it with style and ease.
You have to trust that when your partner yells, “Clear right!” there won’t be anything to hit or run over when you punch the gas.
Getting in an accident in an ambulance running hot (with lights and siren going) is considered ‘poor form’ and is unimaginably embarrassing.
And no matter what, the accident will be your fault. The only possible exception I can think of is if someone who is whacked out on drugs and alcohol blows a red light driving the car from the back seat while engaged in a sexual act. And it’s all on high definition videotape.
When you’re approaching an intersection you only have so many options and the traffic will always dictate how you get through the intersection.
If you have a green light, hopefully everyone pulls to the right and you carry on your merry way. If the light is red and all the lanes are full of cars, then you simply move into the oncoming lanes and hope nobody is blasting Metallica on their stereo and looking on the floor for a CD, or in my day, a cassette tape.
As loud as our horns and sirens seem, there is always someone who will try and screw your world up if you’re not exercising acute situational awareness.
Danger lurks everywhere. People who smoke cigarettes with all the windows up and the music blasting away are one example. Folks who are turning left are notoriously dangerous.
Then we have the goofball who stops his car like everyone else, but then wonders why everyone is stopped and suddenly decides to pull out in front of you. Crash boom bang, day ruined.
How about the Mommies and Daddies who are busy smacking their kids in the backseat, or the person who is still half way down the street doing seventy and wants to get through the yellow light.
Personally speaking, old people who are deaf as golf balls and can’t see past the hood of their car have always ranked high on my obstacle list.
You may have seen the jogger on the corner sidewalk that can’t stop his legs from running while waiting for the light to turn. His legs jump the gun and jog him right into the intersection.
Of course he doesn’t hear our siren because his joggy music is blaring through the headphones on his head. Headphones are great for exercising but bad for loud things that run you over.
Teenagers for the most part just don’t have a clue along with a large population of adults who shouldn’t drive a toothbrush.
Last and by no means least is the fairer sex. The women, who put on makeup, talk on the phone, have lunch and attempt to drive a huge SUV.
The list goes on and on and on. And our job is to weave our way through all this, get to someone who may be dying and do it as fast and as safely as we can.
Of course all this sniveling is just that. Without all those sightless geriatric pot-smoking deaf female phone talking music blasting left turning jogger SUV drivers, there wouldn’t be anything to keep us on our toes, or keep our adrenal glands pumping out its addictive high-octane sweetness, and there wouldn’t be anything to put a pucker in our pooper.
I think everyone should, at least once in their life, jump out of a plane (with a parachute) and drive an emergency vehicle running hot.
Copyright Mike Cyra 2010This story was sent to me from Mike Cyra. It is copyright material and used with his permission. It is a story from his book Emergency Laughter. Thanks Mike!
My peripheral vision instantly notified my brain that it wasn’t seeing his foot move over to the brake pedal. My brain, multi-tasking its ass off screamed, “What?” Then scrambled a message to my vocal cords and my make-a-wish department. It screamed, “The other pedal, put your foot on the other pedal. Step on the brake you lame-ass sick son-of-bitch mother fucker!”
I scanned the intersection and saw cars speeding in both directions in front of us. It looked like a stampede.
When the cars that were stopped at the red light started flashing past us on my right, my legs went stiff as I pressed both my feet into the imaginary brake pedal.
I started yelling like a Drill Sergeant, “Slow down! Slow fucking down! Slow down now!”
My partner snapped out of it and finally jumped on the brakes. But it was too little, too late. I put my hands on the ceiling and my body went rigid as I stood on my useless brake pedal.
All I could do was brace for impact and scream like a soprano drill sergeant, “Stop, stop, stoooooop!”
My screams of terror were drowned out as we skidded to a tire screaming siren blaring stop. I heard other car tires screeching and waited for the inevitable crash of metal but none came.
I couldn’t see how close we had come to hitting anything because the ambulance was enveloped in a huge cloud of blue smoke from our tires. For 1.8 seconds I felt almost, free of anxiety hiding in the smoke, I couldn’t see them and they couldn’t see me and it was good.
Then our blue cloud floated away we were left looking at a motionless intersection. I immediately went into damage control mode. I reached over and turned off the siren with the idiotic hope that we would suddenly be less noticeable.
Every person in every car was looking at us. I could feel their stares boring into me. I was embarrassed beyond words.
I quickly decided that as long as no one had been hurt and no damage had been done, the best course of action was to feign control of the situation, tuck tail and get the hell out of Dodge.
Through clenched teeth I hissed at the psychotic EMT next to me, “Start the fucking engine, put it in fucking gear and slowly fucking drive forward.” Without a word my ex-partner inched the ambulance through the intersection.
As we slowly passed two cars that had slid to a stop sideways, I ignored the driver’s angry stares and pointed at them, mouthing, “Are you OK?” and making a big OK sign with my fingers.
I knew everyone was ok, at least that’s what I told myself, but I thought I should make a show of concern anyway. However lame it was.
Just to show everybody that we were still on official emergency business, I pushed a button and blasted two or three short “whoop-whoops” on the siren as we left.
As soon as we were a block away I spat, “Pull over.” I was so pissed I couldn’t talk. I blurted, “What, wha, wha, what the, what? Have you ever driven an ambulance before?”
He smiled broadly and beamed with pride, “No, that was my first time.” My head almost exploded when I thought of how close he came to killing me.
I couldn’t think of a bloody thing to say to him except, “We gotta go!” He actually turned in his seat like he was going to drive until I quietly growled, “Get out.” He seemed surprised but pleasantly chirped, “OH, OK.”
My ass had puckered up so far into my abdomen that I had a hard time walking around the front of the ambulance to the driver side.
I stuffed my pucker behind the wheel and sped off toward the three-car accident that actually happened.
We didn’t chitchat much for the rest of the shift. All I knew was that was the closest I ever wanted to come to wrecking an ambulance, killing a bunch of people and not being able to poop for a month.
Having experienced an out of control incident where the only thing I had control of was jack-shit, my control-freak freakishness went pathological. So I’ve been told.
I didn’t see Mario Ass Puckerer for about six months. He turned out to be a really good EMT who didn’t scare his partners.
For those who haven’t done it, running a red light driving on the wrong side of the road is extremely dangerous. It takes teamwork, communication and a partner you trust to do it with style and ease.
You have to trust that when your partner yells, “Clear right!” there won’t be anything to hit or run over when you punch the gas.
Getting in an accident in an ambulance running hot (with lights and siren going) is considered ‘poor form’ and is unimaginably embarrassing.
And no matter what, the accident will be your fault. The only possible exception I can think of is if someone who is whacked out on drugs and alcohol blows a red light driving the car from the back seat while engaged in a sexual act. And it’s all on high definition videotape.
When you’re approaching an intersection you only have so many options and the traffic will always dictate how you get through the intersection.
If you have a green light, hopefully everyone pulls to the right and you carry on your merry way. If the light is red and all the lanes are full of cars, then you simply move into the oncoming lanes and hope nobody is blasting Metallica on their stereo and looking on the floor for a CD, or in my day, a cassette tape.
As loud as our horns and sirens seem, there is always someone who will try and screw your world up if you’re not exercising acute situational awareness.
Danger lurks everywhere. People who smoke cigarettes with all the windows up and the music blasting away are one example. Folks who are turning left are notoriously dangerous.
Then we have the goofball who stops his car like everyone else, but then wonders why everyone is stopped and suddenly decides to pull out in front of you. Crash boom bang, day ruined.
How about the Mommies and Daddies who are busy smacking their kids in the backseat, or the person who is still half way down the street doing seventy and wants to get through the yellow light.
Personally speaking, old people who are deaf as golf balls and can’t see past the hood of their car have always ranked high on my obstacle list.
You may have seen the jogger on the corner sidewalk that can’t stop his legs from running while waiting for the light to turn. His legs jump the gun and jog him right into the intersection.
Of course he doesn’t hear our siren because his joggy music is blaring through the headphones on his head. Headphones are great for exercising but bad for loud things that run you over.
Teenagers for the most part just don’t have a clue along with a large population of adults who shouldn’t drive a toothbrush.
Last and by no means least is the fairer sex. The women, who put on makeup, talk on the phone, have lunch and attempt to drive a huge SUV.
The list goes on and on and on. And our job is to weave our way through all this, get to someone who may be dying and do it as fast and as safely as we can.
Of course all this sniveling is just that. Without all those sightless geriatric pot-smoking deaf female phone talking music blasting left turning jogger SUV drivers, there wouldn’t be anything to keep us on our toes, or keep our adrenal glands pumping out its addictive high-octane sweetness, and there wouldn’t be anything to put a pucker in our pooper.
I think everyone should, at least once in their life, jump out of a plane (with a parachute) and drive an emergency vehicle running hot.
Copyright Mike Cyra 2010This story was sent to me from Mike Cyra. It is copyright material and used with his permission. It is a story from his book Emergency Laughter. Thanks Mike!
My worst night ever!
Hello, I just remembered one night that I had in the ER that I would like to tell you guys about! It was the worst night I EVER had there! First of all, we were extremely busy, like no open rooms at all and our waiting room had people standing because they had run out of spaces to sit. It was not even the usual BS patients either! We had some very sick patients that night! On top of all this, It was me another good tech that works down there and an extremely lazy agency tech. This girl was so lazy we would find her just sitting in the break room reading or watching T.V. and of course we had to pick up her slack. I understand that agency people may not understand all of the procedures or policies or understand the importance of getting people in and out in a timely manor, but she could of at least seen how busy we were and asking either me or the other regular tech all the things she could help with. Anywho, this night I had just been vomitted on, I had been peed on (on purpose from the patient) I had to empty a rectal foley that was so horrid I wore all of my PPE and masks just so the stench would not get on me, and what do you know happens? Of course some of the fecal matter splashes on my scrubs! So that's vomit, urine and runny fecal matter on my scrubs thus far! So I call our OR and get a new pair sent down to me to change. Well the OR scrubs don't have pockets on them so I had to put my iphone and my wallet in my locker. Back to work I go. Then we have a procedure that I help with that was so bloody, I wound up getting blood all over my scrub top... no problem, I can just take it off and work in my undershirt. It was then one of the nurse asks me to help clean a patient. Again no problem, we clean patients all the time right? What she failed to tell me was that this woman had a major infection in both of her lower extremities and was bed bound at her house, her house that has no AC in the middle of summer! So of course both of her legs are covered with maggots! So I get a little dish, fill it with peroxide, get our medical tweezers and go to town on this woman's maggot infested legs. After an hour or so of feeling like I have something crawling all over me, the agency tech comes in to the room and asks if she can help with anything! Finally! I tell her no, I am finished now, if you could just go to the OR and get me a new pair of scrubs please. Well the night went on, it remained busy for the rest of our shift. After a long night of maddness in the ER, upset patients, crying families and being peed on, pooped on, vomitted on, bled on and maggoted on I am very excited to get to clock out and go home!! I go to my locker to get my iphone and wallet only... of course... GONE! I LOVE MY JOB! I LOVE MY JOB! I LOVE MY JOB! I LOVE MY JOB!
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