Being a medic, the roller coaster(part 3)

 As an EMT life is easier as you are not ultimately responsible for what happens in/on your truck. You are a team for sure however when the rubber meets the road... As I have said before, I had some incredible partners, they were seasoned, and they were great teachers. My partners would let me do anything and everything that they could possibly let me do. I wanted to learn, I wanted to excel and I wanted to be the best at what I did. It was only through their guidance and teaching that I could become who I am today. 


I look back at my EMT days and I am proud of them. I wanted to ride every call that I could. If it wasn't something that legally the medic had to ride then I rode it. I didn't mind doing that way, it was more work but it was also a way to improve my skills, and improve how I interacted with patients and with staff at the hospitals. Unfortunately, nowadays that is not the case, people want to do as little as they can get away with and it shows.


I will never forget the first time that I rode a shooting. The medic that I was with that night was not one of my regular partners but they still let me ride the call. The person was shot in the leg, they were very stable and there wasn't anything that the medic could do that I couldn't. We got the patient up into the truck, the leg stabilized, and did all that we needed to do on scene. My partner looked at me and asked me "You got this?" I said sure do, off we went to the hospital. To say that I was excited is an understatement, I gave a report to the hospital and monitored the patient. What a night that was. 


Being confident in what you do doesn't mean that you can do whatever you want to do. You have to know what is the right thing to do and when to step aside to provide the best care you can. We had a person who was complaining of general weakness, while on the way to the hospital, they started complaining of chest pain. By looking at the patient I knew that there was something new going on and I knew that what was best for the patient was for me to get my partner in the back to give care that I couldn't. The patient was fine in the end, but that call taught me several things. 


One of my favorite call memories that I have with one specific partner was a shooting call. We were called for someone shot that was lying in the road. We arrived on the scene and found a person who had multiple gunshot wounds, it looked as if they were shot while running away from someone. There were probably 5 wounds with one through his junk sack. I asked my partner if I could ride the call? He said, "If you were shot in the sack wouldn't you want to go lights and sirens to the hospital?" See to go lights and sirens you have to have the highest level on the truck in the back with the patient. I looked at them and with defeat in my voice I said: "Your right, I would". Away we went to the hospital. I will never forget those words that they asked me for as long as I live.



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