Today... Got a call around 11:30 for respiratory trouble. Not that much of an issue, right? Well, it took seven people to load the gurney onto the ambulance. We got him back to the clinic, couldn't establish an IV, found his heart enzymes were all positive and decided to send him to Little City (we did everything in the back of the ambulance because moving him into the clinic and then possibly back to the ambulance was out of the question. The gurney wasn't rated for him and would collapse without a couple people supporting it).
Anyways, 10 minutes out from Home, Patient complains of chest pain. Well... We don't have an IV and his blood pressure is hovering around 100 systolic. So we can't give nitro, we can't give morphine... They say MONA greets all heart pain, but this time only the vowels made it. (MONA = Morphine, Oxygen, Nitro, and Aspirin). Then he starts going in and out of consciousness and the heart rate monitor shows that he is going into V-fib. We decided if he went unconscious and we couldn't get him back with painful stimuli in about three seconds, then we'd put in an IO so we could give him meds. One time, we were literally about to put the IO in, we felt out the location and... "wha?" *eye lids flutter open*
Then he started cycling between normal rhythms, V-fib, and A-fib, coinciding with his changes in consciousness. The monitor was screaming at us "ACUTE MYOCARDIAL INFARCTION". At one point, we had the pads out and ready to go, but again, the moment we were about to do something he'd come back. And to top it all off, 20 minutes out of Little City's hospital, he just suddenly came back, heart rhythm became textbook normal, he was fully alert, talking, and the only pain he had was in his bottom from being on it for so long. When we got him to the hospital, the nurse didn't believe us and when we asked her how their ekg looked she was like "oh I didn't even look at it, it's normal"... GRAGH.
Even more annoying, we had called ahead asking for a special gurney and help moving the patient. We get into the ambulance bay and there's the gurney, but no help. So we poke our heads in and ask for three of four people. The guy at the desk looks around, then says "I don't think we have the staff" (there are plenty of nurses just standing at the desk.) The lady (really only four years older than me) EMT-III who had been in the back with me went off on them and we got our help. Eventually. It took a good fifteen minutes just to unload the patient because of this.
We had to mark his neck with a sharpie because we were having so much difficulty locating his carotid pulse that once we got it we didn't want to risk losing it, we only found a radial pulse once... yeah, it was bad. Oh! and we wanted to take a D-stick, because it would have been so convenient if all his problems were coming from high blood sugar. We prick him, turn on the meter and "Low battery, shutting down". NOOO!!!!! Thus began a frantic search for spare batteries. While the other EMT was calling the EMS chief, I was like 'wait, what other small portable objects do we have on the ambulance? THE PORTABLE SAT METER!' After rooting about one of the boxes I managed to find it and thank goodness, two AAA batteries... All ambulances should carry spare batteries. Seriously.
Another random story from the ride. His legs were pretty much too large to fit on the gurney together, so they kept sliding off (in spite of the straps). So we had to keep putting them back on. I swear one leg weighed as much as I did. It was certainly thicker than my waist, but anyways. I had just finished replacing a leg when our driver took a sudden turn. I put my hands down for stability and ended up balancing on them as my legs went into the air. I managed, somehow, not to crash down on the patient and stayed balanced above him until the turn stopped.
Btw, we were going 95 pretty much the entire way... if the ambulance could have gone faster, we would have. Even still, I got back to my house just before 11pm. /sigh
Anyways, do yourself a favor, especially because you'll be doing us a favor at the same time. Go outside and walk. Or bike, I don't care. Just do some sort of exercise that will elevate your heart rate at least four times a week, especially if you have an illness like diabetes. You probably don't realize just how much good it can do for you.
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