Scott’s Blog

Archive for the ‘WLVAC’ Category

Last night was my 7th or 8th night riding the ambulance. Most of my crews were uneventful with the most challenging aspect being how to deal with George’s snoring. Basic calls like the one I had last week where our patient fell off of his motorcycle at 5 mph became very exciting becuase it broke up the monotony of sleeping on the couch. Last night I got my first code (cardiac arrest).

The night started out pretty quickly, we got a first call minutes after our shift started and of course invariably as ever, right as we’re going to get food. The call was a dizzy female who passed out momentarily in her friends car. She was awake and talking to the police when we got there and refused treatment claiming that she has passed out before. Her bp was low 94/63 but she said it was normal for her and signed the RMA. Two of the chiefs has responded and we we’re all talking for a while in the lot when we got another call; “Cardiac Unresponsive, code red, proceed forthwith.” We all jumped in the ambulance and sped off. It was all organized chaos from then on.

The address they gave us was familiar, it was only two houses down from a friend of mine and levittown houses all look the same, I was almost sure it was Kristen’s house as I was running up the driveway and was relieved when I got inside, it wasn’t hers. I carried the backboard and the O₂ in and then proceeded to gather the personal information we needed on our pcr form, 40 year old male with muscular distrophy no other medical history, no meds. I got the name address and social as the rest of the crew was shouting orders in the back room and getting ready to load the patient onto the ambulance, some of the family was there just staring, one of them, the patients sister I think, was hysterical.

One of the things I hate most of all is not being able to do something, especially in an emergency situation like this if I’m not helping then i’m just in the way and that gets me pretty upset. When we loaded onto the bus I was by the head of the patient and I started bagging. I was nervous but all of that was pushed to the back of my head and I had one job and just needed to focus on that. Breath..2…3…4…5…breath…2…3…4…5 We we’re only on the road for about 5 minutes but if someone told me it was 45 minutes I wouldn’t have been surprised.

Everyone around me was working fast, one member tried getting a line in the patients neck, the other tried getting it in his foot, they were pushing epinephrine and atropine, I was still bagging pink frothy fluid was leaking out of his mouth and nose as I was trying to hold them shut. One of the chiefs Eric was doing compressions. Eric stopped so our Lifepack could analyze for a heart rythym, there was one, we took a pulse it was faint and then gone. CPR continued as we rushed out of the ambulance into the ED, finally a doctor took over bagging for me and I got some time to breath myself. I collected the last bit of information that I needed and washed my hands.

I stood around for a bit in a trance slowly processing everything that had happened. Everyone was outside talking and joking around about past calls, discussing this one. They all seemed so nonchalant, not affected. I wasn’t affected as much as I thought I might be. I had wondered how I would handle myself, I thought I did pretty well. I was told I did great, later on I found out that no one bags on their first code, most people just watch. I felt okay.

The patient didn’t make it. The doctors said they had a hearbeat for 5 minutes, but it didn’t last; they said we did good. I’m still ok. I am scared of messing up, of doing something wrong that would cause the patient to deteroriate further, but I don’thave that feeling on this call. I think it was just his time.