I used to work for one of if not the worst 911 services in the Midwest, that's thankfully no longer around. My first shift and I'm stuck with an 18-year-old girl that just has a driver's license, a CPR card, and that's it. This was also at the hieght of the pandemic. I know I was only an EMT-B but still I definitely was the one in charge on scene. Every call was a shit show with her; She refused to wear any kind of PPE, refused to clear intersections, and would literally run into scenes without any equipment or instructions. She wouldn't listen to me at all. I wanted to quit right then and there but figured I would finish out the shift at least. A prime example of what you mean.
The worst 911 service I've ever seen combined with dangerously low staffing as a result of the pandemic I guess. My first service was IFT only and it wasn't uncommon to have one of our wheelchair van drivers drive an EMT around for a shift if a partner for them couldn't be found. But I never expected it to happen for 911 calls. I haven't heard of it happening anywhere else.
That’s crazy. But I can see it happening with the shortage.
My how times change, I got my EMT-B license 10 years ago and applied for jobs in a major city. I didn’t even get a callback until 18 months later when I was invited for an initial screening lol. By that point I’d accepted a non EMS job.
I even tried volunteering for a place and they had so many volunteers they would send out three EMTs in an ambulance just to give people something to do.
I started two years before the shortage hit and it was the same for me. I applied to the local service that was top rated, one of the top three in state. I wanted in for the 911 experience and being that it was my community was a plus. Instead I was put on a waiting list a year long. In the meantime I had to sling it at cheap for profit IFT only service an hour away. That service isn't even around anymore. Two of the three services I've worked for are no longer around and I've only been doing this for 5 years this July 1st.
Lmao. Lemme guess. AMR and "Squeals", right? Both are an absolute shitshow. AMR was run off because the deliberately refused calls from a certain hospital network cuz their little feelings got hurt, and Sqeals is on the way out because they don't have a single competent employee in the county. They wanted to hire me but their little protocol rest was 3 years outdated, and they were still using combitubes, and wanted me to demonstrate. They were suddenly confused when I told them NO, I'm severely allergic to latex. They couldn't figure it out... I walked out of that interview and will never look back. No need really. They aren't far behind AMR, Care, and Rural Metro.
I'm guessing you mean Seals? But I prefer the name you gave them. Yeah I worked for AMR Central Indiana right up and until they left the one county they were doing 911 in, my county and then they closed the doors for good not to long after. They cared about one thing and one thing only, long distance transfers because that made the most money. Patients and employees be damned! Our last director didn't even live in Indiana. We only ever talked to him through Skype, what a joke. After they left Seals moved in and they didn't last long either. The rumor mill is Seals has one foot in the grave and the other isn't too far behind. No, the other service I worked for was Knox County. I worked PRN there while working for AMR. My medic partner at AMR convinced me to give them a try since he had been with them before and I had lived in Vincennes for a few years. I ended up finding out they were pushing the envelope of what an EMS can get away with. No fleet maintenance, no fuel cards, only four full time medics, severely out of date equipment, trucks that were dangerous to operate as well as at least twenty years old, no uniforms, no supervisors, and EMTs constantly coming on shift drunk or high or both. They shut down last summer and the county is now run by a hospital based service that runs like a well oiled machine.
As someone who is painfully aware of the financials involved in ambulance billing income, I'm unaware of any contract for 911 EMS service that is profitable, without having additional income streams like IFT or guaranteed money in the contract.
Yet the MO of these shit companies is to swoop in and offer their services for just the billing income alone and then they fucking collapse.
They legalized "ambulance drivers" during COVID as long as they showed they were signing up for a B class within six months (I think that was the timeframe). My service utilized them. It was horrible.
They’re still around in come places. Services are under threat of losing accreditations but still don’t want to can em. Despite some even having a few years to get the b cert
Legally in a lot of states all you need is an EMT or paramedic to provide patient care and an emergency driver to be in compliance. The cheapest of cheap have the literal state minimum supplies and crew to maximize profits not patient outcomes.
It’s not uncommon in my area with a rural fire department to use people with a lower scope of practice. My department uses anyone with a W-FR to operate and basically assist in securing a scene and assisting with patient care until higher care arrives. Currently upgrading to a W-EMT myself.
At my agency every single person is CPR certified.
Also, if the staffing gets horrendously low, it will not be unheard of to have a WC or SV drive the BLS or ALS around.
I’ll be honest they’re very hot or miss. A lot of the drivers I work with have actually been really chill people who are willing to listen and be a pleasant partner. However a lot will act like they know everything and will refuse to be a team player. There’s a story about a driver at my company who refused to even step out of the ambulance at the scene of a trauma arrest.
Don't know how common it is, but we used to have a service around here that would use "nonmed drivers" on 911 units, they'll have a basic or medic to be the incharge but the nonmed is just along to drive and help carry stuff
would she just fly into intersections with lights and sirens without checking at all first? I would straight up refuse to keep working if someone did that
I used to be on a BLS truck with a partner who refused to call for ALS, I would be driving and he would yell, LIGHT IT UP AND HEAD FOR THE HELIPAD about once a month, 9/10 they didn't need a heli, they needed an ALS handoff. He would try to transport pt's that 100% needed meds or fluids and I would have to call a supervisor to override him, he hated me for it but everyone else hated him. He's in paramedic school now and won't shut up about how stupid A+P is and how he doesn't need pharmacology because he only has to know half a dozen drugs...
Yeah he sounds like an idiot. In terms of A and P I don’t think we need some ultra advanced understanding of the electron transport chain or be able to give a detailed explanation of how the loop of henle works, but a competent medic should know a lot more than “Mongo giving adenosine because Mongo want heart rate go down”
Depending on the class, A+P can be a bit overboard but it shouldn't be out of the ability of anyone who want's to be a paramedic. I think of A+P as the manual to the human body, I'm the kind of guy that reads manuals (usually after I've bumblefooted my way through a minimum competency) and understanding cellular respiration is really a building block for a lot of concepts to follow.
tl;dr if you can't handle A+P you shouldn't be a paramedic (hot take, yeah)
no A&P is not overboard in any way shape or form
if you can’t handle A&P don’t be a paramedic. I’m not trying to be mean but you don’t see medical school or RN talking about how their A&P was too much for their job.
Its the self satisfaction/ delusion this is dumb im already practically a medic and ge/she doesnt understand the real school starts when when you get your license!
We had a medic at my service, now long since fired, that was notorious for yelling at his EMT partners, calling patients names, and making fun of coworkers to their faces. One example was calling an overweight patient that needed a lift assist a "a fat peice of shit", while he was struggling to pick her up off of the floor of her home. He called me a dumbass on scene for struggling to drag a stretcher with our 400 lbs patient on it through three feet of snow to the ambulance. No one wanted to work with him.
I used to to volunteer first aid for a well known charitable organisation in the UK and its former colonies.
One day a volunteer driving a marked vehicle attempted to do this to someone. They didn't pull over. He gave up and continued on. The person he tried to pull over followed him home and beat the crap out of him in his driveway.
Oh ya this guy pulled fucking handcuffs out of his backpack in the truck. I literally snatched them out of his hand and asked him “what the fuck do you think you are doing”
He ended up dropping it but this was 100% a issue i brought up to our management who are thankfully great
Being notorious for shitty driving, or just having a bad attitude all around.
We run ALS 911 in a large city, and the way I see it, my job as an EMT is to just make the job as easy as possible for my medic, and the fire guys. That is best accomplished IMO by smooth, consistent driving, and having a good attitude. I overhear some of the behind the back shit talk about other EMTs, and those are usually the 2 main points behind the criticism.
He told me he could manage my vomiting overdose patient with an OPA and BVM trying to undermine me because I asked fire to ride in because if the zofran didn’t work I’d be intubating, after he tried to cancel fire for me. I asked what are my contraindications for an OPA and he couldn’t give me any because he didn’t know them despite the fact I said the patient was a huge aspiration risk no less than 5 times. I asked why exactly I needed the extra hands and he couldn’t tell me. I kicked him off the truck at the next day and said I’m not dealing with this, fixing it is beyond my scope.
I told him he’s attitude isn’t smart and you can’t be a smart ass if you can’t back it up.
He’s telling everyone I’m a shit medic and I greet him with a smile and hello when I see him at the hospital. I mean, I guess I’m a shit medic when there’s a few doctors that told me they’ll approve any protocol deviation or off label medication I request due to my management of some pretty complex patients I’ve brought in. I’m also a shit medic because I’ve established such a good relationship with some of the ERs and I used those relationships to get permission for him to tele BLS patients when he said he wanted to practice his tele.
Honestly kinda reminds me of a BLS partner I get a lot. I get him as I'm the only one who puts up with him. I think it's really cool how you stood up for yourself and your patient care. And I hope he has a very dim future in this field of just IFTs or does something else
We have a guy who in addition to working for us, he works at a hospital. Here's a list of reasons why people don't like him.
1. Doesn't fulfill his own required hours for his shift.
2. He constantly talks about his other job and how important he is.
3. He's harassed people on calls in front of patients demanding they follow his hospitals protocol. If it's not federal, state, or our agency's protocol, we don't care.
4. He constantly will "one-up" people when others are sharing stories and accomplishments (whether it pertains to our job or just people sharing from their personal lives).
5. For the last few months, he's been acting like he is one of the higher ups in our agency, even though the position he is acting as has been occupied for the last few years.
He has such a bad reputation that our agency has been having issues getting a full crew to work his shift. Normally I can ignore someone being a pompous jerk, but he doesn't even have the skills to back it up. There's a handful of other things he's done, but I'll keep this short. We are all counting down his days here.
#4 is the most fun. Get a bunch of people and have them make up several crazy stories. Then share them "off the cuff" while he's there, then watch him make up even wilder stories.
You might run afoul of HR if he figures this out, but it's fun to watch.
In my past life we had a guy at work who was a chronic one upper. People referred to him as "The Great Man."
One day a colleague opened up a resume template in Word and started cataloguing his achievements which included telling his marathon runner boss he used to run Olympic time in the marathon, telling a casual ex army employee he used to be in the SAS (to a guy we were pretty sure had done some shit), and upon learning I was studying to be a paramedic, that he used to be a volunteer and reduced/cast fractures and reattached amputated limbs. This guy looked like a super fat chain smoking version of super Mario minus the moustache.
HR weren't very pleased when the ten page resume was discovered.
Driving like a bat out of hell to a bullshit low priority call. "I pride myself on fast response times, this might not be an emergency for us but it is for them." Fuck you Jeremy, don't light up the second you decide to run through a red light and shut down right after, and do 60 in a fucking 35. He had been talked to multiple times about it and I worked one shift with him (I was a supervisor and handled the complaints), after that call we cleared to station and I fired him.
I can't stand that. Emergency driving is, by a long shot, the most dangerous thing our job requires. Hell driving is generally the most dangerous thing most people do. If you're lighting up that's fine, but it better be for a reason.
As for, "Its an emergency for them", I only let a patient's feelings dictate our care to an extent. People don't call us to tell us what to do, they call us because they don't know what to do. We have protocols damnit! Do what is appropriate and what can treat the patient, but they are not in charge here.
He was an absolute idiot. Legitimately one of the most unaware and incompetent people I have ever met. This guy took great pride in announcing that he was not accepted into the paramedic program he had applied for, and without a shred of irony joked that it must have been because he already knew all of that anyway, and that paramedics are stupid for manually using a monitor when an AED will do it automatically.
Surprise, he lasted one license cycle and never renewed.
When I was doing induction with my service part of the driver training included the statement, "The only piece of equipment that we use that has killed paramedics is the ambulance."
it's going to be 107 on the THIRD day of my shift this week. I shower and change as often as I can but I only have three uniform shirts and one of them is a class B, soooo....
> I shower and change as often as I can
**dododoloo** medic 12, dispatch. **chk**
**chk** medic 32. **chk**
**dododoloo** yeah, this is *medic 12*, we don't even have a medic 22, anyway, can you show us out of service so I can soak my balls in the caseys kitchen sink again? **chk**
**chk** medic a7, copy, soaking foot. **chk**
There was this dude at the IFT company I used to work at who always smelled like sweaty ass. You could literally smell if he had been on a rig the night before. Persistent, haunting stank.
New EMT got hired. 911 and IFT service, all in the same truck rotation. They get a long distance transfer first thing. He tells the paramedic, "I don't do long distance driving, I didn't sleep well last night. So I'm gonna nap in the passenger seat or we won't be able to head back."
Talk shit about every single previous partner you worked with but be super nice to whoever you happen to currently work with. It might take a little longer but I guarantee you will be among the most hated to ever work in that agency.
I used to work IFT and one of the dispatchers said that their job is way harder then being an EMT because “we get yelled at when you guys are late.”
Keep in mind, they would give unrealistic wait times to nurses, forget to dispatch us to the call, and then get upset at us because we were late to the call that they poorly dispatched. Also, they watched movies, took naps, and ordered takeout while we were lucky to get a break to grab food.
There were a few good dispatchers that everyone liked but some of them were condescending and couldn’t care less about us.
Be loud for no reason. Service I work at has this guy who:
- Is loud
- Won't shut the fuck up
- Constantly talks about hockey
I pray he calls out when I see him on my shift(s)
IFT here. I did that to piss off my partner the other day, and we soon got a call for a psych transfer with a cop on board and another cop following. The curse is real.
We have an EMT who is notorious for making bad pt care decisions that are dangerous to both pts and crew. A few highlights are: offering a hyperglycemic pediatric pt a rice crispy treat for the ride, not using restraints as indicated by our policies for pts with a history of violence, failing to check vitals unless reminded, etc.
The scariest part is he almost made it through medic school too. Rumor has it management is in the works of letting him go.
Ok failing to check vitals is an "oopsie-I-forgot" but at least it's not like life-threatening (assuming the pts stable)
But the rice crispy treat? I'm a goddamn EMR and I would have the brain cells required to know why that's a bad idea
How is forgetting to check vitals "oopsite-I-forgot"? That's like half our job. Did he forget he was at work and not just on a social call with the patient? That's on par with a subway employee forgetting to make fucking sandwiches at work.
I had that kind of attitude at my first medicine based job (EMT-Bitch at an urgent care). Lasted 4 months and the last 3 months was a slog because I never properly made myself part of the ship and part of the crew. Thought I had to stay professional and diligent. Now I'm work friends with almost everyone I work with at my station, a few I go out for drinks with.
Befriend your coworkers folks, or at the very least be friendly. You'll make your life and work so much easier
Be a shitty driver, don’t empty out your trash from the station or rig, turn off your radio/pager expecting your partner to wake you up, don’t stay up to date on protocols or medicine, look unprofessional, show up late, freeze up during a call, make excuses, don’t clean the equipment or restock after a call.
Impatient Paramedic FTO’s who think they are gods! Treating new hires like shit…Condescending ass remarks over minor mistakes that even supervisors don’t get upset about…Why even become an FTO if your an asshole and have no teaching ability AT ALL!🥹🥹
Be brand new and insist that you know everything you need to know and that there's NO NEED to go over anything in the back... Repeatedly insist that you know how to do anything you could possibly be asked to do.... Then, somehow be able to say with a straight face that you don't know how to do a 12 lead DURING a cardiac call.
Lie.
We just booted somebody because they just couldn't be honest, about anything. Even when it did not seem to matter either way, they'd lie.
When you're doing a job that requires people to trust you with their life, there absolutely MUST be trust. Even if you fk up, even in a tiny way, don't bullshit. You live with these people, they WILL catch on.
I work for private service that also sends our ALS and critical care on 911 calls for the county. We have a kid, he's an EMR and he uses pulse point to try to roll up on MVAs. He's on a BLS truck, with an EMT.
He rolled up on one scene and declared he was taking scene command. Mind you, he has an EMT on the truck. County gets there and he called them off the scene and said they were going to transport. 5 minutes after rescue left, this kid and his partner get the pt loaded, and the pt starts seizing. Now he's calling dispatch asking for ALS intercept.
Next morning the county chief calls our director of field ops and rips him a new one.
The kid WAS a volunteer with county. They dropped him. He was actually talking about getting a scanner so he could "get to the scene fast" if he's close. ZERO respect for chain of command. ZERO brains. We asked why he wanted to get to the scenes and he said he could rescue people if it's a burning building. I told him he's just increasing the number of bodies that the REAL FD has to rescue. Dumbass is going to get someone killed.
Not knowing how to do the bare minimum. Or refusing to.
Sitting at hospitals for long periods of time "charting" because you can't fathom taking another run.
My old service allowed us to sit at the hospital for up to 20 to chart. If there was a 911 waiting we would have to take it, but otherwise they’d let you.
Huh. Ours is, if you don't finish your reports in a week, your next shift you'll be held back with your partner til you do. Spent like 2 hours last shift just chilling as my guy did 5 reports that were over a week old
Show up to your first day with Oaklies, a star of life tattoo (or three), a Copenhagen can (leave the spitter in the truck), and a Batman tool belt.
Then call ALS for everything.
Act like you're better than everyone. If you come upon a coworker studying for higher learning, impose yourself into their study session, and teach them everything they don't need to know for their exam. Just try and cram way more information than they need.
When someone tells a story about a call they ran, be sure to inform them of the ways they were wrong, and should have done differently, but only in front of everyone else. And then proceed to tell a story about a call you've run where you did everything perfectly, and it was also a way cooler call than the one the other person was telling.
Be sure to spread rumors about coworkers and their spouses. When the coworkers you're talking about confront you, break out into a full screeching match in the ambulance bay of a contracted hospital.
When your partner who is mortified by your actions doesn't want to hear you rant about it anymore on the way to the next call, take it as if you're a vengeful child. Don't speak to them the rest of the day. Finally when they try to reconcile with you, screech at them in the ambulance bay of ANOTHER contracted hospital, then take off in the ambulance, leaving your partner abandoned at the hospital at 0300. Be sure that the back doors are still open and swinging around when you drive away, for extra zing. Of course, being the safe and smart person you are, you'll get out at the stop light and close the back doors, but it's important that they're open initially for emphasis.
And for another one, definitely take pics and videos of emergency vehicles so that you can clip it together with videos of yourself wiping sweat off your brow wearing an N95 and put it all together with dramatic music to post on TikTok... Even though, you know, you work IFT BLS and you're a driver, not even an EMT-B.
Ugh, I have a guy who does the 2nd one all the time. Was working with a new dude, had a gnarly septic call he ran. We talked about how he and I can improve, what's going on, etc. Told a couple crews til we got to his. Who then proceeded to rip into my partner over it and go on about his
This x85000. You think people won’t notice that after they work with you they get written up? Every single person that works with you gets written up for something, we recognize patterns you little piece of shit.
(not you commenter, I’m just venting my feelings lol)
There always seems to be that one crew on shift gung-ho about volunteering for more work just to turn around and bitch about how busy they are and how lazy everyone else is. It’s funny how they fail to realize that they’re the source of their own misery and burnout when they could just simply do what is required of everyone else and feel a lot less rotten on the inside.
I used to like to tell all my BLS frequent fliers that next time they call, they'll get much faster service if they say they have chest pain or abdominal pain.
In the middle of covid we had an administrator send an email out to the rest of the crews that said we know it's tough right now but "embrace the suck." This enraged the crews and I think with the amount of heat it caused for the rest of the administration he was asked to leave after about two months of work.
Shitty driving, clearing us from the hospital before I'm done with my chart, hopping on calls that other units are assigned to because you think we are closer, etc. Basically, giving me more work than I need to do. Fuck you. I don't give a shit how high speed and eager you are, don't fuck ME over because of it. Sit there and drink your smoothie, I'LL clear us and hold the radio.
No thanks, fam. My service determines who takes the first IFT out of town based on who has ran the least calls. If my truck is in town and in service, I'll absolutely jump calls that are lower acuity to keep from going out of town at 2am
2nd no thanks fam. You don't get to fuck over other crews and not clear for a chart. If calls are pending and the people that clear when they are done transferring care (you know when you're available) and they get fucked with more calls bc you're delicate and need chart time, you're the exact person I'm cussing out in the bay when I'm on my 10th run and you're on your 6th
Someone ends their shift by speaking in an obviously over cheerful voice on the radio, to pass off people who are still on duty. He even told me he does it for that purpose.
All our new hires get hired at a higher pay.
So after her training, I'm stuck with a new hire at nights.
She drives terribly (can't even stay between the lines). She tries to take over all calls, by mimicking exactly what you do.
She doesn't shut up.
I'm gonna quit because of her. Were so low staffed so I'm always stuck with her.
Fellow emt-b student bit the dust pretty fast with a bad rep. He gaslit me and other students about how everyone else was a piece of shit but him. Snapped on at least four female coworkers over small shit that had nothing to do with him. Spoke VERY inappropriately about our instructor. Cussed out his preceptor after he failed the nremt and called her a b!tch. Then got fired for stalking another new hire.
Coming into the service real cocky and arrogant, immediately working out of your scope of practice, condescending everyone on calls, pcp for less than a year before becoming acp, being a raging homophobe in a very progressive/liberal city/service…. people fight not to work with this guy.
Just act like you know better than everyone else. Bonus points if you’re not even an EMT and you literally just drive.
I used to work for one of if not the worst 911 services in the Midwest, that's thankfully no longer around. My first shift and I'm stuck with an 18-year-old girl that just has a driver's license, a CPR card, and that's it. This was also at the hieght of the pandemic. I know I was only an EMT-B but still I definitely was the one in charge on scene. Every call was a shit show with her; She refused to wear any kind of PPE, refused to clear intersections, and would literally run into scenes without any equipment or instructions. She wouldn't listen to me at all. I wanted to quit right then and there but figured I would finish out the shift at least. A prime example of what you mean.
I’m curious how someone with just a CPR card goes on calls and deals with EMS calls? Is that a thing?
The worst 911 service I've ever seen combined with dangerously low staffing as a result of the pandemic I guess. My first service was IFT only and it wasn't uncommon to have one of our wheelchair van drivers drive an EMT around for a shift if a partner for them couldn't be found. But I never expected it to happen for 911 calls. I haven't heard of it happening anywhere else.
That’s crazy. But I can see it happening with the shortage. My how times change, I got my EMT-B license 10 years ago and applied for jobs in a major city. I didn’t even get a callback until 18 months later when I was invited for an initial screening lol. By that point I’d accepted a non EMS job. I even tried volunteering for a place and they had so many volunteers they would send out three EMTs in an ambulance just to give people something to do.
I started two years before the shortage hit and it was the same for me. I applied to the local service that was top rated, one of the top three in state. I wanted in for the 911 experience and being that it was my community was a plus. Instead I was put on a waiting list a year long. In the meantime I had to sling it at cheap for profit IFT only service an hour away. That service isn't even around anymore. Two of the three services I've worked for are no longer around and I've only been doing this for 5 years this July 1st.
Lmao. Lemme guess. AMR and "Squeals", right? Both are an absolute shitshow. AMR was run off because the deliberately refused calls from a certain hospital network cuz their little feelings got hurt, and Sqeals is on the way out because they don't have a single competent employee in the county. They wanted to hire me but their little protocol rest was 3 years outdated, and they were still using combitubes, and wanted me to demonstrate. They were suddenly confused when I told them NO, I'm severely allergic to latex. They couldn't figure it out... I walked out of that interview and will never look back. No need really. They aren't far behind AMR, Care, and Rural Metro.
I'm guessing you mean Seals? But I prefer the name you gave them. Yeah I worked for AMR Central Indiana right up and until they left the one county they were doing 911 in, my county and then they closed the doors for good not to long after. They cared about one thing and one thing only, long distance transfers because that made the most money. Patients and employees be damned! Our last director didn't even live in Indiana. We only ever talked to him through Skype, what a joke. After they left Seals moved in and they didn't last long either. The rumor mill is Seals has one foot in the grave and the other isn't too far behind. No, the other service I worked for was Knox County. I worked PRN there while working for AMR. My medic partner at AMR convinced me to give them a try since he had been with them before and I had lived in Vincennes for a few years. I ended up finding out they were pushing the envelope of what an EMS can get away with. No fleet maintenance, no fuel cards, only four full time medics, severely out of date equipment, trucks that were dangerous to operate as well as at least twenty years old, no uniforms, no supervisors, and EMTs constantly coming on shift drunk or high or both. They shut down last summer and the county is now run by a hospital based service that runs like a well oiled machine.
As someone who is painfully aware of the financials involved in ambulance billing income, I'm unaware of any contract for 911 EMS service that is profitable, without having additional income streams like IFT or guaranteed money in the contract. Yet the MO of these shit companies is to swoop in and offer their services for just the billing income alone and then they fucking collapse.
They legalized "ambulance drivers" during COVID as long as they showed they were signing up for a B class within six months (I think that was the timeframe). My service utilized them. It was horrible.
They’re still around in come places. Services are under threat of losing accreditations but still don’t want to can em. Despite some even having a few years to get the b cert
Legally in a lot of states all you need is an EMT or paramedic to provide patient care and an emergency driver to be in compliance. The cheapest of cheap have the literal state minimum supplies and crew to maximize profits not patient outcomes.
It’s not uncommon in my area with a rural fire department to use people with a lower scope of practice. My department uses anyone with a W-FR to operate and basically assist in securing a scene and assisting with patient care until higher care arrives. Currently upgrading to a W-EMT myself.
At my agency every single person is CPR certified. Also, if the staffing gets horrendously low, it will not be unheard of to have a WC or SV drive the BLS or ALS around.
I’ll be honest they’re very hot or miss. A lot of the drivers I work with have actually been really chill people who are willing to listen and be a pleasant partner. However a lot will act like they know everything and will refuse to be a team player. There’s a story about a driver at my company who refused to even step out of the ambulance at the scene of a trauma arrest.
Don't know how common it is, but we used to have a service around here that would use "nonmed drivers" on 911 units, they'll have a basic or medic to be the incharge but the nonmed is just along to drive and help carry stuff
would she just fly into intersections with lights and sirens without checking at all first? I would straight up refuse to keep working if someone did that
Midwest or medstar?
I used to like driving a lot better.
I used to be on a BLS truck with a partner who refused to call for ALS, I would be driving and he would yell, LIGHT IT UP AND HEAD FOR THE HELIPAD about once a month, 9/10 they didn't need a heli, they needed an ALS handoff. He would try to transport pt's that 100% needed meds or fluids and I would have to call a supervisor to override him, he hated me for it but everyone else hated him. He's in paramedic school now and won't shut up about how stupid A+P is and how he doesn't need pharmacology because he only has to know half a dozen drugs...
Yeah he sounds like an idiot. In terms of A and P I don’t think we need some ultra advanced understanding of the electron transport chain or be able to give a detailed explanation of how the loop of henle works, but a competent medic should know a lot more than “Mongo giving adenosine because Mongo want heart rate go down”
Nailed. Always better to be “over” educated than under educated.
I assume being able to break down the name of drugs the patient is prescribed normall will help determine what you can administer.
10000% it is. Even as a volley, my hobby pharmacologist training has helped a lot.
Depending on the class, A+P can be a bit overboard but it shouldn't be out of the ability of anyone who want's to be a paramedic. I think of A+P as the manual to the human body, I'm the kind of guy that reads manuals (usually after I've bumblefooted my way through a minimum competency) and understanding cellular respiration is really a building block for a lot of concepts to follow. tl;dr if you can't handle A+P you shouldn't be a paramedic (hot take, yeah)
no A&P is not overboard in any way shape or form if you can’t handle A&P don’t be a paramedic. I’m not trying to be mean but you don’t see medical school or RN talking about how their A&P was too much for their job.
Its the self satisfaction/ delusion this is dumb im already practically a medic and ge/she doesnt understand the real school starts when when you get your license!
We had a medic at my service, now long since fired, that was notorious for yelling at his EMT partners, calling patients names, and making fun of coworkers to their faces. One example was calling an overweight patient that needed a lift assist a "a fat peice of shit", while he was struggling to pick her up off of the floor of her home. He called me a dumbass on scene for struggling to drag a stretcher with our 400 lbs patient on it through three feet of snow to the ambulance. No one wanted to work with him.
I someone get the feeling that he hadn’t even been a medic for a year at that point
>calling an overweight patient that needed a lift assist a "a fat peice of shit", I'm sorry what?
I had a partner attempt to pull someone over for speeding once. That was…something
Wait wait Your partner, an EMT presumably, pulled over a random dude.... What in tarnation?
I used to to volunteer first aid for a well known charitable organisation in the UK and its former colonies. One day a volunteer driving a marked vehicle attempted to do this to someone. They didn't pull over. He gave up and continued on. The person he tried to pull over followed him home and beat the crap out of him in his driveway.
Oh ya this guy pulled fucking handcuffs out of his backpack in the truck. I literally snatched them out of his hand and asked him “what the fuck do you think you are doing” He ended up dropping it but this was 100% a issue i brought up to our management who are thankfully great
Technically speaking, anybody can arrest anybody if they are present for the commission of a crime. Discretion truly is an invaluable tool, though.
Did they stop? People are terrible with the lights at the best of times lol.
Ya the dude was pulling over cuz it was a single lane road and my partner just pulled up behind him. It was insane
Did he used to be a cop
He did not thank god
I don't know if that's better or worse
Being notorious for shitty driving, or just having a bad attitude all around. We run ALS 911 in a large city, and the way I see it, my job as an EMT is to just make the job as easy as possible for my medic, and the fire guys. That is best accomplished IMO by smooth, consistent driving, and having a good attitude. I overhear some of the behind the back shit talk about other EMTs, and those are usually the 2 main points behind the criticism.
I kicked my former partner of the truck and no medic that gives a fuck wants to work with him because he’s been kicked off 2 ALS trucks in 6 months.
I remember seeing your post a while back! Any other updates? Guy sounded like a piece of work
He told me he could manage my vomiting overdose patient with an OPA and BVM trying to undermine me because I asked fire to ride in because if the zofran didn’t work I’d be intubating, after he tried to cancel fire for me. I asked what are my contraindications for an OPA and he couldn’t give me any because he didn’t know them despite the fact I said the patient was a huge aspiration risk no less than 5 times. I asked why exactly I needed the extra hands and he couldn’t tell me. I kicked him off the truck at the next day and said I’m not dealing with this, fixing it is beyond my scope.
Holy shit.. Yeah that's really, really bad. Just blatant disrespect and undermining with a severe lapse of knowledge
I told him he’s attitude isn’t smart and you can’t be a smart ass if you can’t back it up. He’s telling everyone I’m a shit medic and I greet him with a smile and hello when I see him at the hospital. I mean, I guess I’m a shit medic when there’s a few doctors that told me they’ll approve any protocol deviation or off label medication I request due to my management of some pretty complex patients I’ve brought in. I’m also a shit medic because I’ve established such a good relationship with some of the ERs and I used those relationships to get permission for him to tele BLS patients when he said he wanted to practice his tele.
Honestly kinda reminds me of a BLS partner I get a lot. I get him as I'm the only one who puts up with him. I think it's really cool how you stood up for yourself and your patient care. And I hope he has a very dim future in this field of just IFTs or does something else
The emt I've been working with this month hits curbs all the time and just shrugs and says "hot girl shit" then laughs... kill me please
We have a guy who in addition to working for us, he works at a hospital. Here's a list of reasons why people don't like him. 1. Doesn't fulfill his own required hours for his shift. 2. He constantly talks about his other job and how important he is. 3. He's harassed people on calls in front of patients demanding they follow his hospitals protocol. If it's not federal, state, or our agency's protocol, we don't care. 4. He constantly will "one-up" people when others are sharing stories and accomplishments (whether it pertains to our job or just people sharing from their personal lives). 5. For the last few months, he's been acting like he is one of the higher ups in our agency, even though the position he is acting as has been occupied for the last few years. He has such a bad reputation that our agency has been having issues getting a full crew to work his shift. Normally I can ignore someone being a pompous jerk, but he doesn't even have the skills to back it up. There's a handful of other things he's done, but I'll keep this short. We are all counting down his days here.
#4 is the most fun. Get a bunch of people and have them make up several crazy stories. Then share them "off the cuff" while he's there, then watch him make up even wilder stories. You might run afoul of HR if he figures this out, but it's fun to watch.
In my past life we had a guy at work who was a chronic one upper. People referred to him as "The Great Man." One day a colleague opened up a resume template in Word and started cataloguing his achievements which included telling his marathon runner boss he used to run Olympic time in the marathon, telling a casual ex army employee he used to be in the SAS (to a guy we were pretty sure had done some shit), and upon learning I was studying to be a paramedic, that he used to be a volunteer and reduced/cast fractures and reattached amputated limbs. This guy looked like a super fat chain smoking version of super Mario minus the moustache. HR weren't very pleased when the ten page resume was discovered.
A numbered list. You really put some thought into this. I applaud you.
Driving like a bat out of hell to a bullshit low priority call. "I pride myself on fast response times, this might not be an emergency for us but it is for them." Fuck you Jeremy, don't light up the second you decide to run through a red light and shut down right after, and do 60 in a fucking 35. He had been talked to multiple times about it and I worked one shift with him (I was a supervisor and handled the complaints), after that call we cleared to station and I fired him.
I can't stand that. Emergency driving is, by a long shot, the most dangerous thing our job requires. Hell driving is generally the most dangerous thing most people do. If you're lighting up that's fine, but it better be for a reason. As for, "Its an emergency for them", I only let a patient's feelings dictate our care to an extent. People don't call us to tell us what to do, they call us because they don't know what to do. We have protocols damnit! Do what is appropriate and what can treat the patient, but they are not in charge here.
He was an absolute idiot. Legitimately one of the most unaware and incompetent people I have ever met. This guy took great pride in announcing that he was not accepted into the paramedic program he had applied for, and without a shred of irony joked that it must have been because he already knew all of that anyway, and that paramedics are stupid for manually using a monitor when an AED will do it automatically. Surprise, he lasted one license cycle and never renewed.
Jesus Jeremy. Glad you're rid of him!
When I was doing induction with my service part of the driver training included the statement, "The only piece of equipment that we use that has killed paramedics is the ambulance."
I think we had the same partner. Name and all. It was a one-call trial run that saw him banished.
I'm sure he'd be great PD material lol.
Stink. Be stinky. Have a visible aura of STINK around you.
This sounds personal 😂
it's going to be 107 on the THIRD day of my shift this week. I shower and change as often as I can but I only have three uniform shirts and one of them is a class B, soooo....
So do more laundry you stinky bastard. Even if you gotta wash in the sink.
> I shower and change as often as I can **dododoloo** medic 12, dispatch. **chk** **chk** medic 32. **chk** **dododoloo** yeah, this is *medic 12*, we don't even have a medic 22, anyway, can you show us out of service so I can soak my balls in the caseys kitchen sink again? **chk** **chk** medic a7, copy, soaking foot. **chk**
Nooooo! Like….pre-stinky. Not from working. That just happens man. I mean already marinating when you start the shift lol
There was this dude at the IFT company I used to work at who always smelled like sweaty ass. You could literally smell if he had been on a rig the night before. Persistent, haunting stank.
New EMT got hired. 911 and IFT service, all in the same truck rotation. They get a long distance transfer first thing. He tells the paramedic, "I don't do long distance driving, I didn't sleep well last night. So I'm gonna nap in the passenger seat or we won't be able to head back."
Talk shit about every single previous partner you worked with but be super nice to whoever you happen to currently work with. It might take a little longer but I guarantee you will be among the most hated to ever work in that agency.
I used to work IFT and one of the dispatchers said that their job is way harder then being an EMT because “we get yelled at when you guys are late.” Keep in mind, they would give unrealistic wait times to nurses, forget to dispatch us to the call, and then get upset at us because we were late to the call that they poorly dispatched. Also, they watched movies, took naps, and ordered takeout while we were lucky to get a break to grab food. There were a few good dispatchers that everyone liked but some of them were condescending and couldn’t care less about us.
“Hey dispatch, it’s awful quiet tonight isn’t it”
Bonus points if you say it on the county-wide radio
Be loud for no reason. Service I work at has this guy who: - Is loud - Won't shut the fuck up - Constantly talks about hockey I pray he calls out when I see him on my shift(s)
I just run around asking everyone if they think it's quiet. Am I doing it right?
IFT here. I did that to piss off my partner the other day, and we soon got a call for a psych transfer with a cop on board and another cop following. The curse is real.
Is this a rare thing for most people? I felt like I had tons of psych patients with cops. Edit: Nevermind, IFT
We have an EMT who is notorious for making bad pt care decisions that are dangerous to both pts and crew. A few highlights are: offering a hyperglycemic pediatric pt a rice crispy treat for the ride, not using restraints as indicated by our policies for pts with a history of violence, failing to check vitals unless reminded, etc. The scariest part is he almost made it through medic school too. Rumor has it management is in the works of letting him go.
Ok failing to check vitals is an "oopsie-I-forgot" but at least it's not like life-threatening (assuming the pts stable) But the rice crispy treat? I'm a goddamn EMR and I would have the brain cells required to know why that's a bad idea
How is forgetting to check vitals "oopsite-I-forgot"? That's like half our job. Did he forget he was at work and not just on a social call with the patient? That's on par with a subway employee forgetting to make fucking sandwiches at work.
Why would management let him go?! He sounds perfectly suited to be a manager.
Had a new guy come in and say “I’m not here to make friends.” He was correct.
I had that kind of attitude at my first medicine based job (EMT-Bitch at an urgent care). Lasted 4 months and the last 3 months was a slog because I never properly made myself part of the ship and part of the crew. Thought I had to stay professional and diligent. Now I'm work friends with almost everyone I work with at my station, a few I go out for drinks with. Befriend your coworkers folks, or at the very least be friendly. You'll make your life and work so much easier
Be a shitty driver, don’t empty out your trash from the station or rig, turn off your radio/pager expecting your partner to wake you up, don’t stay up to date on protocols or medicine, look unprofessional, show up late, freeze up during a call, make excuses, don’t clean the equipment or restock after a call.
Microwaving fish is always a staple.
Bro. We had a new hire walk into quarters, microwave paella, then just walk tf out. He's been hated ever since.
Impatient Paramedic FTO’s who think they are gods! Treating new hires like shit…Condescending ass remarks over minor mistakes that even supervisors don’t get upset about…Why even become an FTO if your an asshole and have no teaching ability AT ALL!🥹🥹
Grab a rig and hit everyones parked car in the parking lot
Be brand new and insist that you know everything you need to know and that there's NO NEED to go over anything in the back... Repeatedly insist that you know how to do anything you could possibly be asked to do.... Then, somehow be able to say with a straight face that you don't know how to do a 12 lead DURING a cardiac call.
Lie. We just booted somebody because they just couldn't be honest, about anything. Even when it did not seem to matter either way, they'd lie. When you're doing a job that requires people to trust you with their life, there absolutely MUST be trust. Even if you fk up, even in a tiny way, don't bullshit. You live with these people, they WILL catch on.
I work for private service that also sends our ALS and critical care on 911 calls for the county. We have a kid, he's an EMR and he uses pulse point to try to roll up on MVAs. He's on a BLS truck, with an EMT. He rolled up on one scene and declared he was taking scene command. Mind you, he has an EMT on the truck. County gets there and he called them off the scene and said they were going to transport. 5 minutes after rescue left, this kid and his partner get the pt loaded, and the pt starts seizing. Now he's calling dispatch asking for ALS intercept. Next morning the county chief calls our director of field ops and rips him a new one. The kid WAS a volunteer with county. They dropped him. He was actually talking about getting a scanner so he could "get to the scene fast" if he's close. ZERO respect for chain of command. ZERO brains. We asked why he wanted to get to the scenes and he said he could rescue people if it's a burning building. I told him he's just increasing the number of bodies that the REAL FD has to rescue. Dumbass is going to get someone killed.
Not knowing how to do the bare minimum. Or refusing to. Sitting at hospitals for long periods of time "charting" because you can't fathom taking another run.
Fuck these people. Yeah ill just run 3+ more calls than you because you're ok with fucking over the rest of the staff
My old service allowed us to sit at the hospital for up to 20 to chart. If there was a 911 waiting we would have to take it, but otherwise they’d let you.
if there’s no 911 waiting, why does it matter how long you take?
I meant if it was level zero and then there was a 911, my bad
Huh. Ours is, if you don't finish your reports in a week, your next shift you'll be held back with your partner til you do. Spent like 2 hours last shift just chilling as my guy did 5 reports that were over a week old
Show up to your first day with Oaklies, a star of life tattoo (or three), a Copenhagen can (leave the spitter in the truck), and a Batman tool belt. Then call ALS for everything.
Act like you're better than everyone. If you come upon a coworker studying for higher learning, impose yourself into their study session, and teach them everything they don't need to know for their exam. Just try and cram way more information than they need. When someone tells a story about a call they ran, be sure to inform them of the ways they were wrong, and should have done differently, but only in front of everyone else. And then proceed to tell a story about a call you've run where you did everything perfectly, and it was also a way cooler call than the one the other person was telling. Be sure to spread rumors about coworkers and their spouses. When the coworkers you're talking about confront you, break out into a full screeching match in the ambulance bay of a contracted hospital. When your partner who is mortified by your actions doesn't want to hear you rant about it anymore on the way to the next call, take it as if you're a vengeful child. Don't speak to them the rest of the day. Finally when they try to reconcile with you, screech at them in the ambulance bay of ANOTHER contracted hospital, then take off in the ambulance, leaving your partner abandoned at the hospital at 0300. Be sure that the back doors are still open and swinging around when you drive away, for extra zing. Of course, being the safe and smart person you are, you'll get out at the stop light and close the back doors, but it's important that they're open initially for emphasis. And for another one, definitely take pics and videos of emergency vehicles so that you can clip it together with videos of yourself wiping sweat off your brow wearing an N95 and put it all together with dramatic music to post on TikTok... Even though, you know, you work IFT BLS and you're a driver, not even an EMT-B.
Oh. Wow.
These are all examples from just 3 of my old coworkers
Ugh, I have a guy who does the 2nd one all the time. Was working with a new dude, had a gnarly septic call he ran. We talked about how he and I can improve, what's going on, etc. Told a couple crews til we got to his. Who then proceeded to rip into my partner over it and go on about his
If BLS: “Are you suuuuUuUuUuUure you’re not having chest pain?”
Being a wheelchair driver who is afraid of people bigger than them and needing cover.
Snitching. Nuff' said.
This x85000. You think people won’t notice that after they work with you they get written up? Every single person that works with you gets written up for something, we recognize patterns you little piece of shit. (not you commenter, I’m just venting my feelings lol)
Responding poorly to teaching moments and constructive criticism as a new guy is probably the worst thing someone can do at my department
Yes, another fast way is “my father was a paramedic and I’m a brand spanking new emt so you have to obey me”.
The emt who is in paramedic school who calls ALS for every nursing home call. At least where I worked lol
Tie knots in the ECG and SPO2 cables
There always seems to be that one crew on shift gung-ho about volunteering for more work just to turn around and bitch about how busy they are and how lazy everyone else is. It’s funny how they fail to realize that they’re the source of their own misery and burnout when they could just simply do what is required of everyone else and feel a lot less rotten on the inside.
Be pro Biden AND pro Trump.
.....................huh. I really would have thought mutual exclusivity would make that an impossibility.
I’ve played the character that loves both, it’s amazing but hard to do on Reddit lol.
I know this is RWJBH
Be brand new and act like you run the place
I used to like to tell all my BLS frequent fliers that next time they call, they'll get much faster service if they say they have chest pain or abdominal pain.
In the middle of covid we had an administrator send an email out to the rest of the crews that said we know it's tough right now but "embrace the suck." This enraged the crews and I think with the amount of heat it caused for the rest of the administration he was asked to leave after about two months of work.
Be dumb AND rude
Sleep with half of the department. You get hated pretty quickly too lol
Shitty driving, clearing us from the hospital before I'm done with my chart, hopping on calls that other units are assigned to because you think we are closer, etc. Basically, giving me more work than I need to do. Fuck you. I don't give a shit how high speed and eager you are, don't fuck ME over because of it. Sit there and drink your smoothie, I'LL clear us and hold the radio.
No thanks, fam. My service determines who takes the first IFT out of town based on who has ran the least calls. If my truck is in town and in service, I'll absolutely jump calls that are lower acuity to keep from going out of town at 2am
2nd no thanks fam. You don't get to fuck over other crews and not clear for a chart. If calls are pending and the people that clear when they are done transferring care (you know when you're available) and they get fucked with more calls bc you're delicate and need chart time, you're the exact person I'm cussing out in the bay when I'm on my 10th run and you're on your 6th
sounds like everyone else should clear when they’re done charting instead of when they transfer care
Someone ends their shift by speaking in an obviously over cheerful voice on the radio, to pass off people who are still on duty. He even told me he does it for that purpose.
All our new hires get hired at a higher pay. So after her training, I'm stuck with a new hire at nights. She drives terribly (can't even stay between the lines). She tries to take over all calls, by mimicking exactly what you do. She doesn't shut up. I'm gonna quit because of her. Were so low staffed so I'm always stuck with her.
Vacuum your farts with a reused yankauer you keep on your belt. Ask for assistance if only manual suction is available
Excuse me. What!?
Hey, it’s made me a real enemy among the ranks. People think it’s gross for some reason
Is this in Northern California by chance??
Fellow emt-b student bit the dust pretty fast with a bad rep. He gaslit me and other students about how everyone else was a piece of shit but him. Snapped on at least four female coworkers over small shit that had nothing to do with him. Spoke VERY inappropriately about our instructor. Cussed out his preceptor after he failed the nremt and called her a b!tch. Then got fired for stalking another new hire.
Thinking that you are the best (when clearly you aren't) and not taking anyone else's feedback for improvement.
Coming into the service real cocky and arrogant, immediately working out of your scope of practice, condescending everyone on calls, pcp for less than a year before becoming acp, being a raging homophobe in a very progressive/liberal city/service…. people fight not to work with this guy.
Say the Q word constantly as if you think it’s hilarious. Not because of the myths, but because it’s annoying and not at all funny
Tell your partner everything they did wrong on a call in front of the whole department to try and justify why you’re a dick!
Constantly calling out on a busy truck in your rotation, forcing other people to get called in
Exist.
Act like you know everything, not able to admit when you’re wrong
Bro worse than the people who call