Status Update: December

Team:

Orienting with the aforementioned ambulance company in mid-January. News to follow after that.

Really want to learn about running a megacode. Borrowing medic textbooks from the library.

Reconsidering PA, considering MD. Thoroughly okay with the idea of taking a few years after college to work and find out what it is I'm looking for in a medical career.

Knit myself a hat. =)

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Also, I'd like to give a shout-out to the other BEMCo TA liaison-person, who is currently in the middle of her first ever ambulance shift! I'm incredibly envious of her--but here's to that it all goes well. Rock on, girl.

Good news!

Greetings everyone!

I bring a variety of good news. Going chronologically:

1) I've completed my CPR instructor certification. My card will be on its way this week, and I'm now allowed to teach CPR up to the BLS level. My first class will be a BLS refresher on the 1st. We're also starting to teach people CPR with AED, as part of the new public access defibrillation program at Brandeis. Very exciting!

2) After driving out to drop off my resume and cover letter last week, I am currently in the pre-employment process at a local ambulance company. I had an interview on Monday, had my pre-employment drug test done day (my first one ever!), and I'm in the process of getting an attested copy of my driving record. Hopefully, I'll start with orientation in December! The internet is notoriously poor with conveying emotion, but I am through the roof about this. I have wanted to work for this company since I was an EMT student, and I plan on working with them until I go to PA school around 2015.

3) Completely not related to EMS, but I'm turning 20 tomorrow!

ETA: I am 20 now! Yay!

Have a happy and safe Thanksgiving, readers!

All three of you =)

love letter

To the Brandeis community,

This is what happens when you call BEMCo.

When the pager goes off, I will most likely swear, sometimes rather loudly, since I’m probably being interrupted. I might be making dinner or watching a movie or trying to finish that lab report that is due tomorrow and why didn’t I start sooner? But I will turn on my radio, put on my shoes and jacket, and wait for someone to come get me to take me to you.

I will see you at your worst: sick, scared, drunk, unresponsive, covered in your own vomit, bleeding, alone, embarrassed—sometimes, just having a bad day. These things happen to everyone—everyone falls down or drinks too much or just doesn’t feel well sometimes. I will sit with you, hold your hand, and say just that. “Don’t apologize, you’ve done nothing wrong,” I find myself saying so much.

People often complain about how boring it is to be the secondary—on paper, our duty is to fill out the paperwork. Our job is to ask you, “Where do you live? What’s your social security number? Do you have Brandeis insurance?” It gets boring. We stand around, get things from the truck, get in the way. I’ve realized that this is the absolute bare minimum for what the secondary should do. The primary’s job is to direct medical care—and you will be well cared for in that respect, I assure you—and the tertiary’s is to take vitals. I’ve taken it upon myself to care for you. I want to make sure that even if you do not remember my name, remember my face, you will remember that you did not feel alone.

I will explain things to you in a way that you will understand. If you need to go, I will try to find your wallet, your phone, your shoes. No one likes being in the hospital without these things. Depending on what happened, I may ride with you to the hospital, or I may help take you down to the ambulance. Whatever happens, I will tell you what is happening every step of the way, and when we get there, I will say to you, “I hope that when we see each other again, it will be under better circumstances.” Or I may say to you as they load you into the ambulance, “Feel better—” and I will call you by your name. I do not want you to be just a call statistic number.

I will return to my life, and eventually, you will return to yours. Perhaps our paths will cross. Like middle schoolers who like each other, I cannot make the first move. So you may—I’ve been hugged, thanked, apologized to. I never expect it, so when it happens, it’s the highlight of my week. Just seeing you back on campus and healthy is reward enough—everything else is a bonus. I really cannot express this in words.

Or you may not remember me, which is what I generally expect. I’ll probably look at you a little longer than most when I scan the room, perhaps passing over twice—yes, it really is you. You’re back on campus, and seemingly doing well, and that will be satisfaction enough for me.

Forever yours,

Mariah

Quick Update

I know that I've been doing a terrible job of keeping up on this blog, and I promise I will post something substantive soon. But for now:

I love EMS even more now. I can feel that I'm getting better with patients. I don't feel awkward talking to them anymore. I feel like I actually know what I'm doing on scene. And I do. And it's awesome.

Mariah

Always a Student

Summer is in full swing (and has been for a while). I'm currently in my second semester of chemistry at a state college near my house, preparing for a lifetime in the medical field. I'm doing very well, and am very glad that I don't need to spend the 3 hours out of class for every hour in class that they suggested.

I'm working at BU once or twice a week, and I'm loving it. Honestly, the worst part is the commute. I find that many of the lead instructors are willing to let me lead as much as I'm comfortable, which is great. It's interesting to be on the teaching side of the table, so soon after being a student.

I also took a CPR instructor course--I have to teach two classes before I officially finish the course. It was interesting--the AHA has found that videoinstruction is the best way to teach CPR, so there wasn't a lot to learn in the course.

I'm also currently working my way through Kelly Grayson's "A Paramedic's Story: Life, Death, and Everything in Between." So far, I love it.

I'm in class now, so I should go pay attention to the lecture, but here's for the quick update on my life.

It's Been a While

Ah, summer. There's nothing to do here, but I'll be damned if I don't busy myself with something. Last summer: property office and EMT school. This time around: Chemistry, TAing EMT school, and actually seeing people. And the endless, fruitless, search for work.

Chemistry! I've decided to be a Physician Assistant. I don't want to do the full-out med school thing. I want to work closely with patients. I want to work--in the Navy? I keep surprising myself with these things. But I'm taking my prerequisites and checking off the boxes for applications. It's like being in high school again, except it's for real this time. Applying to and attending a masters program means making a choice about what I want to do. There's no "undecided" major in PA school.

TAing! Like at Brandeis, but with money. I love it. I led my group in CPR on Sunday, becuase I had a wonderful lead instructor who was willing to let me take charge. It felt really good--everything came together. Considering going for I/C at some point.

Seeing people! Last summer, I would work, school, sleep, repeat. I saw Matt every two weeks if I was lucky. I went for a walk with my best friend the other night, had a few bonfires with the hometown crew (accompanied by a lovely phone call to my parents from the police--but nothing happened), late night meanderings around town, seeing that nothing really changed.

Job search! Blurgh. Harassing HR people at a few places. Trying to find somewhere that will take me per diem that I can access form Brandeis. Without a car. Options are severely limited. Also, the fact that PA programs require EMT work to be "more than just patient transfer" means that what I can do as a basic in the Boston area might not count. Looking at places that will train me as a CNA while I work for them, but it feels like a step back. Making beds and wheeling patients around and monitoring bedpans--they're important tasks, I know, but I'm already trained for so much more. The fact that CNA work counts but patient transfer doesn't bothers me. I can't change the system though, so all I can do is roll with it.

So that's my life. Matt and I are coming up on our 1.75 year anniversary and yes I still count the months. When I look at my life as of two years ago and how it is now, I can't help but be happy when each month rolls around.

PA people! Military medical professionals! CNAs! I'd especially love to hear what you have to say about all this. Leave a comment, if you're so inclined!

EMS Week, Here and Everywhere.

So, as many of you know, last week was EMS week. A week for us to let others know what we do, and a week for others to thank the EMS providers for what they do. Also, a lot of facebook status-copying and blogging and tweeting among the community members.

This past week was also my own personal EMS week. I remained on campus for senior week as an on-duty EMT, rocking the 3 days on, 1 day off schedule. I learned that it's totally okay to shower while on duty, and that trying to move from one dorm to another without a car while carrying the jump kit is not a fun thing to do. There was a decent amount of drama in the corps over this week, and for once, it was all boys (men?) at the center of it.

I enjoyed spending the week with the other members of the corps, and shared a 6-person kitchenless suite with my supervisor. I got to spend time with senior class members that I might not see again, and spent a decent amount of time with Matt, who also graduated at the end of the week.

Commencement itself was the big deal for the week--we had 9 EMTs (1 supervisor, 2 provisional primaries, 5 secondaries, and 1 tertiary) scheduled to be at mini-commencements around campus at various times of the day, and then we were all scheduled to convene at the Convocation center for the Main Commencement. It was all planned very well, and looked to be going smoothly until one of the primaries wasn't able to be there. We ended up having two double-secondary crews with the supervisor floating around where needed. Not ideal, but certainly effective. The eight of us made things work.

The whole day was somewhat surreal--I was in a dress uniform that was too big for me, pants that had a glorious amount of pocket space, and had a radio (with an earpiece!) that made me feel way more important than I was. I got to see Paul Simon sing "The Boxer" and give a speech, and I got to see Matt graduate. It was a good thing I was so busy, otherwise I probably would have been a puddle of tears.

Matt's family saw me responding to a call, Matt had to explained the concept of "privileged patient information" to his brother when he started asking me a bunch of questions. Following the whole day, I went back to my room, showered and got into a nice dress, and we out to dinner with his family.

All in all, it was a great week. I responded to two calls in more than 7 days, so while it wasn't a huge experience week, I got to know my fellow corps members better, and had a fun time doing so (awww). I applaud all involved with the commencement detail, and especially our operations officer, Dan. In spite of all of the last-minute problems and radio failures, he made it work.

Happy week after EMS week, everyone!

Saving Lives?

There’s a girl on campus who often asks me if we’ve “saved any lives today” or if I’m “heading off to save lives” when I’m going to shift change. I’ve heard this a few times, but every time she says something, I’m not sure how to respond. Usually she gets “not yet” for an answer, but sometime, when we both have a minute, I’ve got some serious discussing to do.

Truth be told, we don’t save lives all that often. There are a few things we do/use that will immediately do some serious life-saving: any of our drugs, suctioning and maintaining an airway. And, somebody please correct me if I’m wrong, but we don’t do a lot of any of these here at Brandeis. Generally, we make things easier for someone who’s in a not-so-pleasant situation. If you ask me if I’ve ever saved someone’s life, I’ll tell you, “No.” Sometimes we make the call for help if someone’s in need of ‘saving,’ people with more training and more equipment, but that’s a call anyone could make.

I can’t fault her for asking—I do, however, feel like I can fault myself, her other EMT friends, the media’s portrayal of the profession, and the fact that people who speak up against that only do so within the EMS community. When people ask, why not ask, “What does ‘saving a life’ mean to you?” Explain what we do, what we can do, what we can’t, what we have done, and what we’re trained to do but very well might never have the chance to do. If you have a problem with how we’re depicted in Trauma*, or even in Emergency!, don’t just blog about it to those of us that share the sentiment; talk it up with other people.

It’s strange to think that on the same campus as people who call for Tylenol or for cotton stuck in the ear, there are people who think we can do anything. There’s got to be a middle of the road somewhere.


*I watched Trauma, all 18 episodes of it. I enjoyed it. I knew it wasn't accurate. It was good for a laugh and some decent TV dramatics, more MCIs than you can count on one hand, and one highly improbable result of a helicopter crash.

Surprise surprise!

I expected to be the tertiary today, but when the secondary failed to show up and the one who had been on duty needed to leave, I signed in for her. The tertiary is now on his second shift in a row, and I'm taking my first secondary shift! The bag's not that different, just slightly harder to carry, but lighter, somehow. Meetings and class tonight, more updates to come if anything happens.

Well, this is a first for many things. My first secondary call (I really like this whole "chat with the patient, get their info" thing) (also, I may have had it recorded with me as the tertiary, no big deal, but I did write up the call since I stole the shift from another dude). But, more interestingly, this was the first time I've had a really appreciative patient. Not that it's ever what I expect, but when the pt just seems so thankful for the little things, it's nice.

Not entirely jobless!

I still have about a week until I have my interview with presently-unnamed ambulance company (not sure about revealing names on here, we'll wait and see). But as the title states, I'm not entirely jobless at the moment!

After the BU EMT class here finished, I emailed the program director to see how I could go about becoming a paid instructor. I didn't expect it to happen for a while, since I only started assisting this semester. An email from one of the instructors reaffirmed my assumptions. However, I also received an email from the head director, asking when I could come in to sign papers. I made an appointment, went in, and asked what I needed to sign.

"Employment papers!"

I worked their extrication/practical exam prep day on Saturday, and look forward to doing this for the rest of the summer and next year when they're at Brandeis again and even during the fall, if I can get to BU. I'm excited--my summer of EMS is coming together.

Good news so far!

So, I've had a good week recently, and quite of bit of it is EMS-related.

1. I've been promoted to secondary in my EMS organization! Starting in May, I'll be taking down patient information and using the stair chair. I'm also excited to get a second uniform shirt, so I won't have to wash the one that I have all the time.

2. I have a job interview with a local ambulance company in a week! They didn't immediately say no to the idea of me working full time in the summer and per-diem in the school year, so that's a good sign. If anyone has tips on interviewing with ambulance companies, let me know, please.

3. This has nothing to do with EMS, but I was accepted to the performance track of the music major--I'll be giving one recital a year for the next two years. I'm excited.

4. I'm considering going to PA or nursing school after I get my bachelor's degree. I had been planning to go into counseling or clinical psych for a while, but having done some counseling, the passive approach to problem solving just wasn't sitting well with me. I'm not pre-med now, so I'd need to take a few years to get my bio/chem/anatomy/physiology requirements done, but I'm prepared to do that. If anyone has experience as a Physician's Assistant or as an RN and are willing to chat about it, please comment or send me an email (msh2012@brandeis.edu)

That's where I stand right now. Things are changing but I feel good about them.

A Day in the Life: Take Two

1640: Paul asked me if I would help put the bags back in the truck, since we take them all out when we go out of service.

1644: We cannot find the keys. They are in Dispatch. Paul goes to start the car.

1700: The truck will not start. I stay in the office and sign in and chat with Charlie while Paul, Dan, and the supervisor try to fix it.

1720: The truck works! Something is wrong with the supervisor vehicle, though.

1730: Back in room. Waiting for Matt to call me back about dinner.

1800: Matt should be here soon. Reading a book for class.

1810: Call Matt to see where he is. He tells me that he's leaving now. He's rather slow at getting places.

1830: Went with Matt to Usdan, got burritos.

1854: in the C-store. Pager goes off. I mistake it for the bad music, then, realization dawns, and I go off. Crew splits to a second call. Mine is for a wrist injury, and it looks pretty bad. We treat and the pt is transported. Back to the office for write-up. Paul insists that the truck not starting earlier was a bad omen, and that we're in for a long night.

1959: Back in my room, I receive an e-mail stating that I have exceeded 15 GB of bandwidth. It's ridiculous, because there's no way that it actually happened. All I've done today was stream an episode of Trauma. Maybe the people in charge realize that it's terrible and are determined to keep me from watching it in the future. Highly doubt it, and will continue to watch Trauma in secret.

2133: Still reading "Stone Butch Blues" for class. Thinking of heading down to see how Matt's doing soon.

2150: In Matt's room. I do some readings, he playing video games. We watch "Wallace and Gromit: The Wrong Trousers" and I relive my childhood. He's been sick, so we cuddle for a while (mostly upon my request).

0030: We go to Einstein's for food. Mango bar!

1020: Leave Matt's. He's not feeling well at all, and didn't go to work today. =( I stop by the man in charge of the internet here, and he told me that he'll look into why I exceeded bandwidth. Back in my room, I have a hard time getting any wireless. I had a dream last night that I was transported to my home in an ambulance, standing. It was more of an RV than an ambulance.

1200: Went to class.

1318: Back in room, have a smoothie. Bringing lunch down to Matt before my next class. He's still sleeping =/

1700: Back in the office. Hand off to Mike, hang out for a few minutes, decide to go to Stats even though it's boring. Had Chamber Choir in the hot recital hall (it's 87 out and I'm in long pants) and in Theory we listened to atonal music. I don't get it. Not a bad shift, but I feel like such a whacker for craving more. Experience can't come fast enough.

Back to High School: EMS Style

1 April, 2010. 1432.

I’m applying to Paramedic school!

Happy April, everyone. Yesterday, I did something kind of fantastic. I talked to a few classrooms of high schoolers about EMS. When I was in high school myself, I took the sports medicine class because I needed another gym credit and didn’t want to play dodgeball for another half-year. In the class, we learned basic anatomy, cranial nerves, GCS, basic treatment of minor injuries (RICES, etc), CPR, splinting, and about electrical stimulation therapy and massage therapy. We also watched a lot of Man vs. Wild and Survivorman and videos of people getting injured on YouTube. While we had a lot of fun, we actually did work—I recall writing a paper about bleeding disorders and sports and reviewing an article about hypothermia as a treatment for spinal injuries.

When I was in EMT school, I found that knowing basic anatomy was really helpful in the first few lessons—I didn’t need to focus on memorizing which was way prone and which was supine and what the anatomical position looked like. I emailed the teacher, Mr. Scott, over the summer to thank him, while I was still training.

The other day, maybe two weeks ago, I had the idea to ask if he would be interested in having me come to talk to his classes about EMS. He thought it was a great idea, I made a powerpoint, prepared a presentation, got props from Dan, and went to the High School yesterday.

For 7:30 and 9:50 in the morning, the students paid attention. The second class even asked me questions—some were about how we don’t transport, many were along the lines of “what’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen?” but it showed that they were paying attention. My wonderful brother and sister, Matt and Rae, went to my presentation, which made me really happy.

I explained how I got into EMS, explained our scope of practice and listed some key BLS skills, talked about the training process, levels of certification and ALS/BLS differences, where EMTs work, and what meds we can give. I talked about BEMCo as well, since that’s where my experience is—how we operate, roles of each member of the crew, showed the inside of the truck and the inside of my jump kit, and then walked through a mock call. The call was for difficulty breathing with urticaria and angioedema. I walked them through the process of responding to a call, importance of BSI, the initial assessment, administration of an Epi-pen, SAMPLE history, vitals, physical assessment, and transfer of care to medics. I felt it was comprehensive but not too detailed. I had a lot of fun writing the presentation, and I realized as I was writing it that I didn’t need to make presentation notes for me to look on with—I knew what I wanted to say for each slide, and there was no way I was reading off of the slides. For props, I had a copy of one of our run sheets, vomit bag, gloves, CPR shield and mask, my scope, and my watch (I realize my watch is not a prop, but I made the point that much of patient assessment can be done by listening to the patient, touching the patient, and getting some basic vitals.)

My presentation lasted about an hour, which was perfect, as it left 5 minutes for questions, which was just enough time to keep them interested. If I could have done anything differently, I would have taken a moment to stress that it is not all lights and sirens, that it’s not all about being the hero—I talked about working transfer, but I wish I had emphasized that even if we’re not doing intense treatment with CPR or Epi-pens or using the LSB, we’re still helping someone to feel better.

I really like teaching—it’s a challenge and it reminds me of what I know. I wasn’t asked any technical questions, but I felt that any question that a student could ask me, I would be able to answer. That’s a good feeling. When the teacher asked at the end of my presentation what I want to do when I graduate, though—I have no idea. I didn’t plan on falling in love with EMS.

If anyone wants to see the powerpoint I made and used, let me know and I can send it your way.

What We Do

1702: After realizing that it takes far more time to get from the music building to my room to the office than I anticipated, I sign in. Text the primary to compliment his miraculous parking job.

1710: Back to my room, get my things for class. Head to Stats for all of 20 minutes.

1730: Back to room again, to get my jacket. Head to a movie screening for my Queer Studies class.

1836: Get a text from Matt during the movie and I can feel my heart rate go up. No matter. He asks if I want dinner. I do.

1916: Back in my room again. Update this. Get my things together to go to Matt's place.

2259: After doing many strange things, including sharing a bowl of frozen yogurt and having yet another playfight with Matt, I am back in my room. Supposed to do work, will likely watch House or Trauma and read case histories for abnormal psychology. Apparently my blue long sleeved shirt is not uniform (gray or white).

2334: Watching House from last week. Not doing homework. Sleep soon.

2352: Totally checked my pager when pagers went off on House.

0108: Going to bed in fifteen minutes or so.

0236: Going to read case studies for Abnormal and going to sleep after.

0400ish: Matt arrives, I continue sleeping.

0840: Wake up, think about going to class. It's raining, and I'm sleepy, so I go back to bed with that Matt boy who I'm dating.

1010: Matt gets up to go take an exam.

1050: I finally wake up. Put my work clothes back on, take my meds, wait a few minutes, update this, and find breakfast.

1115: Sign up for Research Methods, go to Usdan, check my mail, get food, chat with a secondary and a primary and read the April fools issue of "The Justice."

1212: Mom is here, I pick up meds and things from her, go to Epstein for a talk.

1332: "Demystifying the Digital Collage" was beautiful and interesting, but the audience was entirely older white women. Got to see Mom =) Back here. Didn't have to respond to any calls from Epstein, very happy about that.

1408: Went to Usdan with Matt to buy him lunch--after all, he bought me dinner last night. Head over to office hours with my Queer Studies teaching fellow, told her about BEMCo when she asked what my jump kit was.

1520: Back at room, going to Shapiro with Matt to see some avant-garde art.

1540: We are starting to think that the avant-garde performance is telling a bunch of people that there will be art and then having nothing happen. But the performers showed up and it was very strange and they put makeup on each other in the Atrium.

1629: Back in my room, thinking about starting the paper before shift change.

1710: Back in my room after shift change. Don't know when my next shift is, sometime in April, though.

Well, it appears that I chose to quietest shift possible to blog about. I'll post a similar entry like this when I have another shift--in the meantime, I'm looking for employment, TAing the class, and possibly getting into a movie with the Corps.

Standing By

14 March, 2010. 1228.

Last night, when I went to the office to get the gear for the standby, I was well into mentally preparing myself for the night ahead. I had vomit bags in my back pockets, ready to be pulled out, two sets of gloves in my front pockets, a little notebook in my other pocket with a pen, so I could take down patient information on the go, I had a snack in my jacket, tic-tacs for if the smell of drunk partygoer vomit got too intense—I was ready for a long night of introducing myself over the music and attempting to get the minimum of information before we transport (name, age/birthday, meds, allergies. A set of vitals if we can).

Instead, I spent the next four hours sitting at a table in the lobby, bonding with the secondary, dance-attacking the primary and supervisor with said secondary and telling people that, no, they couldn’t leave their coats at the BEMCo table. We needed the space to, you know, care for patients.

Our one patient was not even that—we gave them band-aids and an alcohol swab.

My duty, as the sole female on the crew, was to periodically patrol the women’s room and make sure that no one was slumped over on the toilet/sink/floor/dividing wall. The first time I did this, I received the response of, “Hey, you’re a man—never mind.”

I’m well aware of the fact that I often appear less than female. With short hair and a uniform that still manages to be too large on me, it’s understandable. I ought to use this little talent for my own benefit—evading long women’s room lines sounds like a good plan.

Now, the reason for our lack of patients was not that people decided to be responsible and not consume a week’s worth of alcohol in one evening—no, they were just leaving and going to their rooms before they went to us. The main crew split to three calls at one point, there were more, I think. Meanwhile, the three of us sat at a table and bounced around condom balloons.

After it ended (four hours later, technically five with the time change) the three of us went to CVS to get some food and returned to our places of residence. I crashed, rather unexpectedly, after removing my completely drenched clothing. To the crew that’s still on now—I hope you are managing to stay somewhat dry.

I’m a little disappointed at our lack of people—I was hoping to get some decent experience out of this. But you know, getting paid to hang out with friends for four hours isn’t too bad.

Titles and Teaching

Dates and times, while beautifully simple and clean, give no information about the following post. From here on out, entries will have titles. Most likely alliterative titles or silly ones and clever ones.

So, that covers the "titles" part of the title. On to "teaching."

BU has been teaching the EMT class here at Brandeis since the beginning of the semester, and I have been volunteering as a TA assistant (A teaching assistant assistant? Sort of!) Basically, the class is divided into lecture and lab: lecture is, well, lecture. "This is glucose. This is how you administer it. This is when you administer it." Lab is learning how to use the skills learned in lecture as part of patient treatment and assessment. In some labs, it's very hands-on (O2, CPR, trauma, splinting, etc) and in others, it's mostly talking through a call.

As an assistant TA, I work with a lead TA, someone who has been leading lab groups for a while and knows what to do. We get a set of scenarios and talk the students through it. "You are dispatched to a 38 year old female who was in a car crash on the highway at 8 AM. Go."

It's interesting being in the teaching position so soon after having been in the student position. When the students completely didn't know what to do in their first assessment lab, I remembered what it was like on that lab--I was the kid who didn't know what the instructor wanted to know. "I don't know what you're asking--I just want to know about the pulse."

They're learning the little acronyms for things and sure enough, a few assessment labs later, they're no longer struggling to remember things like "color, temperature, condition" and "rate, rhythm, quality." It's also very reassuring for me--as someone with very little field experience, I haven't had the opportunity to do most of the things I learned about--but the lead TAs tell me that I know my material very well. My only problem TAing? Telling people when they're doing something correctly. I ought to write "COMPLIMENT SANDWICH" on my hand next time.

It's fun, I get CE hours, I'm technically getting job training.

(Also, EMT students: "Common complaints" ARE NOT THE SAME AS "pertinent negatives.")

12 February, 2010. 5:25 PM.

So, what’s a girl to do with an EMT certification? Jump into her school’s volunteer corps, of course! I competed at BU’s Yankauer Games with Brandeis (we were pretty awesome) and took my first shift on my 19th birthday. My first call came in during Music History, and I’m pretty sure I didn’t miss anything of consequence.
I’ve taken six shifts and six calls since November. I TA the EMT class at Brandeis (taught by BU) with other BEMCo people and the BU instructors who I was taught by. I really like what I’m doing.

I’m not really here to talk about medicine. It’ll probably end up that way at some point, but right now, I just want to talk about the experience. And I do apologize for dropping off of here for so long—long story short, some people were concerned about the fact that some secondary’s girlfriend was all of a sudden blogging about BEMCo very enthusiastically, that she was going to be an EMT, that she might not know what she was doing. I was warned on my first call, “This doesn’t go in the blog,” but other than that, it’s not an issue anymore.

I try to not to enthuse too much about this, but I’m completely smitten with volunteering here. For those 24 hours when I’m on call, I’m actually a somewhat useful member of society. I’m trying not to end up filling this post with phrases like “being a part of something bigger than me” and “feeling important,” because that’s not really what it’s about. It’s about our patients and what we’re doing for them in that moment. Some of them won’t remember us—most of them won’t. It’s not really us that they’re seeing—I’m not there as a student, as a musician, not even as a female, most of the time. I am my rank and my uniform.

Maybe it’s just from being new, but if I could be on call all the time, I would be. I feel silly when I talk about it to Matt, and I feel misunderstood when I talk about it with my family. I don’t really mind, though.

Also, not to self: I ought to start using 24 hour time on these. (Funny story though: not everyone uses 24 hour, so in class, a student asked if by “16:00-17:00” a professor meant “6:00-7:00” and the professor said in the “No, you moron” voice, “No, I mean 16:00-17:00” and some kind student explained to the first one exactly what the difference was.)

12 February, 2010. 12:26 PM

It’s been a while since I posted anything of substance, and for that I apologize. So much has happened since I put any real effort into this blog—I’ll try to start where I left off.

I completed my training with Boston University last August, with a 100 on my final written exam and only having to redo the KED for the practical (BU practical exams go like this: you have the whole day to pass, you have unlimited repeats of stations, but you cannot do them with the same instructor who failed you).

After training ended, I found myself with 12+ hours a week of extra which I had no idea what to do with. I don’t know if previous posts conveyed this accurately, but my job was terrible. It paid well, and I got to spend time with my Dad, but it was mind-numbing and my coworkers were frustrating to no end. I loved the two months in which, after a long day of working (or pretending to work, as I was sometimes told to do), I would meet my Dad in the lobby, we would go to the car, and I would drive him to Kenmore so he could get the train home and I would drive the rest of the way to BU. I loved being able to just sink into the material and forget that the next day would bring the same boring nine hours that today did. I sat in the front, right in front of the instructor, so I didn’t have to put up with the other students too often. I would go home, enjoying the half-hour of aloneness on my drive back, make lunch and dinner for the next day, talk to Matt and my parents, and go to sleep. Lather, rinse, repeat.

Fall semester started beautifully and busily. My practical exam was in the beginning of September—Matt was my patient, for which I am very grateful. Because my partner disappeared from the face of the earth, only to resurface the morning of the exam, I drove Matt and I to BU for the exam. We went from 8 until 1 or 2. I didn’t have to redo any stations, which left me panicking that I had messed up assessment (because I thought I gave Albuterol to a cardiac patient accidentally) and something else and had failed and would never be an EMT. Fortunately, Matt and I have been together long enough for him to know how to talk me down from slippery slopes such as that, and we drove through Boston to go to lunch. The rest of the afternoon involved falling asleep on the Commons with Matt, having my sister call and tell me that my Mom had been taken by Boston EMS to the BI (they were doing a charity walk with my godmother) and that I should meet them there. We drove through Red Sox traffic to the hospital, where Matt waited in the car, while I went into the ER. Long story short, the day finally ended, we all went home, Mom was fine, and I really just wanted to go to sleep so that the day could be over.

Time passed, Dan showed me where I could check to see if I had passed my practical without waiting for the card in the mail, I continued with my semester until one morning, as I watched Trauma on my computer, I went to check the website. That day, it gave me the option to schedule an exam—I had passed my practical. Much relieved calling to Matt, Dan, and my family, I went to find a computer with Internet Explorer to schedule the exam. Mid October. I wasn’t concerned. I read over my class notes and braved the Orange line to find the exam site. I took a half an hour, and pulled 90/100. After royally failing to use the Orange line properly, I made it back to North Station, got myself an ice cream of accomplishment, and went home.

Damn, this is going to be long. Well, here we are. I’m an EMT.