Third Manning

Ever since I was a kid I wanted to be a paramedic, and today I got my first taste of what it's like 'on the road', when I went third-manning (observing) with a local crew.

I arrived at the ambulance station at 6.30am, and met the people I'd be crewing with. At 6.35am we got a red call so I jumped into the back of the vehicle and we zoomed off on blue lights and sirens. It was very exciting! We got to our destination, and helped to pick an elderly lady up off the floor, where she'd fallen out of bed. She had a severe laceration to her forehead, and was quite confused. One of the crew was an ECP (emergency care practitioner) and could have stitched the patient's forehead himself without the need for her to attend A&E, but because she was confused, it was best that she was given a full check-up, so we took her down to the local hospital. Unfortunately, when the crew was lifting the patient from the floor, the paramedic felt his back 'go', so he got checked out in A&E too (five star treatment all the way!) and was deemed unfit to work, so he did paperwork all day, poor thing.

I teamed up with another crew, and our first call was at about 9.30am, to a 50 year-old-male with chest pain. When we arrived he seemed fine, but there's no knowing with chest pain so we took him to A&E anyway. It was probably just a touch of angina, but it's always better to be safe than sorry. And how right we were! When we dropped off another patient later on in the shift, the A&E staff told us that the patient had suffered a massive MI (myocardial infarction - aka heart attack) and had to have a stent inserted into an artery in his heart. When you have an MI, there's a blockage in the artery, so a special drug (thrombolysis) is given to get rid of the blockage and then you have a stent inserted to keep the artery from narrowing. (If any paramedics/technicians read this and want to correct me or add to that, please feel free!) So, if we hadn't taken our patient in as a precaution, he would almost certainly be dead right now. As it is, he's in CCU (Coronary Care Unit) and is being discharged tomorrow! We also had a patient who phoned 999 because he had a locked jaw, but when he was sitting in the back of the ambulance he forgot he couldn't talk and was chatting away 19-to-the-dozen until we reminded him and he went bright red! I could have given him the number for a cheap taxi service if all he needed was a ride to the hospital, but as it is he could have taken a front-line ambulance away from a patient who really needed it. I hate time-wasters so much!