Adventures in Vehicle Maintenance

on 5/26 we were going emergency traffic to a call when our right front tire broke off and bent into the engine causing us to slide across into the on-coming lane. luckily it was late at night and there was nobody driving against us. we have a beat down fleet and are in dire need of new trucks. the Fords we have have over 200,000 miles and the suspension in all of them is a joke. it is getting embarrassing to explain to the pt's why the ride is so bumpy. you just can't run trucks like we do, hard and with no rest in a 24 hour period. something needs to change. also, my partner that night, JS, had just eaten a cupcake and that was 60% of the blame for the broken axle. junk. in. the. trunk.

I call her Blackcloud...

worked a little overtime on Friday (5/14) and got to work with Angel (AA). every time i get to work with her we run the crap out of some calls. and this day was no different. we had 10 calls in 12 hours with one cardiac arrest, a code medical and a dislocated hip. the cardiac arrest came out as a 33D, cardiac/respiratory arrest at a facility with health care providers on scene. we pulled up to a well known local doctor's office and went in to find this tiny African man (Dr. O) doing chest compressions on a tiny older lady on the floor. there was about 2 gallons of coffee ground emesis on the floor and coming out of her. there was a poorly educated "home health provider" that had brought the pt in and she told the doc that the pt was vomiting blood last night. i asked the person for the pt's history and she stated she did not know. i asked her how old the pt was and, again, she did not know. i then asked her to leave the room and she did without hesitation. AA and i worked her well, very difficult airway (very anterior) and after numerous suctioning our QRV lead medic arrived and was able to intubate her. a firefighter and i lifted her arms straight up which lifts the shoulders and hyperextendeds the neck (this was done after ruling out a fall) and has worked wonders in the past. unfortunately she was in asystole the entire time and was pronounced at the hospital. we then got a call for a 30B2, traumatic injury, where a lady had recent hip replacement and was getting out of her car and twisted wrong and it popped out as she sat into her wheelchair. we arrived to find her in her wheelchair in the heat. she did not fall so we ALSed her there, gave her fentanyl, used a KED inverted to stabilized the hip and took her to the hospital. later in the day we went to a 6D2, breathing problems, and found an elderly man with shortness of breath (SOB) and an impending sense of doom (not good, ever). did a 12-Lead in the house showing his pacemaker was firing but not producing a profusing beat. his heart rate was in the low 40s and his b/p was 80/P. placed the pacer pads on his and got him to the stretcher using a stairchair. we were only a mile away from the hospital and i told the guy that if he relaxes and stops responding to me i was going to have to "light him up" (i know, i know...but it worked. i don't like to shock or pace someone who is talking and fully awake. don't get me wrong, if his b/p was a couple ticks lower i wouldn't think twice about pacing and sedation) which worked. called a code medical and had to take him to the blue zone due to the fact that our recess room was completely full. it was like back in the old ED when we would bring a code medical or code trauma just straight past everyone and into any number of regular rooms to be worked. old school style.