12 hour ambulance ride-along
woke up at 5:30, left the hotel with a thermos full o' joe at 6:15, arrived in san leandro by 7:30. met my trainers, Gary and Nick. fucking hilarious, and nick's a total hottie.
for the next 12 hours, we received 7 calls, visited 4 hospitals, drove to berkeley and back like 6 times, almost got hit at a highway entrance, blasted tijana music, stopped off for snack foods 4 times, drank 12 energy/caffiene/coffee drinks total, cleaned up puke once, lifted and tranfered patients 16 times, and went through about 38 pairs of gloves.
mostly transfers, we dealt with a lot of geriatric patients. unresponsive, blank stares, dying of cancer, feeding tubes, catheters, etc. it really made me think about the last few years of my life. i saw some pretty henious conditions at the nursing homes we went to, and i was assured they weren't the worse. i encourage anyone with a relative in a nursing home to visit, and OFTEN. most nurses don't catch anything until it's too late to do something about it (like blood in the feeding tube, or infected port sites), and it was amazing how starved these people are of love.
every patient was kind of a pain in the ass except for two. we took one 92 year old man to get chemo treatment at alta bates hospital in berkeley, and he was completely alert and kept eye contact with me, he had the greatest smile. i could tell he was really cold though, and it was interesting how he didn't vocalize that, downplaying his discomfort.
the other man was our last call of the night, an 87 year old from georgia, bed-ridden, named condee. we brought him from the hospital back to his nursing home. the whole time, he was crackin jokes and talking about how the one morning they serve bacon, he had to be at the hospital for an appointment, "every goddamn time." then he listed all the pig-parts he *doesn't* eat, and reaffirmed that bacon's the only part he likes. then he started talking about the angels that came to him and his eyes sparkled, and no matter how far into dementia he was, it was fuckin cute. nick and i spent the whole ride talking to him and laughing.
then we went back to the station, and because all our calls were either transport or code 2, i asked them to turn the siren and lights on real quick- it was cool : ) we washed the ambulance and then nick drove me back to the hotel cuz they asked if i wanted to stay the whole shift and forget the shuttle pick-up. he like, totally gave me his digits haha.
anyways, it was pretty cool having all that action, most of the people in the class had either 0 or 1 call. some people had cooler patients, like a drunk woman, or delirious homeless man, or dehydrated high school student, or broken leg.
tis all, test is tomorrow and saturday. wish me luck.
for the next 12 hours, we received 7 calls, visited 4 hospitals, drove to berkeley and back like 6 times, almost got hit at a highway entrance, blasted tijana music, stopped off for snack foods 4 times, drank 12 energy/caffiene/coffee drinks total, cleaned up puke once, lifted and tranfered patients 16 times, and went through about 38 pairs of gloves.
mostly transfers, we dealt with a lot of geriatric patients. unresponsive, blank stares, dying of cancer, feeding tubes, catheters, etc. it really made me think about the last few years of my life. i saw some pretty henious conditions at the nursing homes we went to, and i was assured they weren't the worse. i encourage anyone with a relative in a nursing home to visit, and OFTEN. most nurses don't catch anything until it's too late to do something about it (like blood in the feeding tube, or infected port sites), and it was amazing how starved these people are of love.
every patient was kind of a pain in the ass except for two. we took one 92 year old man to get chemo treatment at alta bates hospital in berkeley, and he was completely alert and kept eye contact with me, he had the greatest smile. i could tell he was really cold though, and it was interesting how he didn't vocalize that, downplaying his discomfort.
the other man was our last call of the night, an 87 year old from georgia, bed-ridden, named condee. we brought him from the hospital back to his nursing home. the whole time, he was crackin jokes and talking about how the one morning they serve bacon, he had to be at the hospital for an appointment, "every goddamn time." then he listed all the pig-parts he *doesn't* eat, and reaffirmed that bacon's the only part he likes. then he started talking about the angels that came to him and his eyes sparkled, and no matter how far into dementia he was, it was fuckin cute. nick and i spent the whole ride talking to him and laughing.
then we went back to the station, and because all our calls were either transport or code 2, i asked them to turn the siren and lights on real quick- it was cool : ) we washed the ambulance and then nick drove me back to the hotel cuz they asked if i wanted to stay the whole shift and forget the shuttle pick-up. he like, totally gave me his digits haha.
anyways, it was pretty cool having all that action, most of the people in the class had either 0 or 1 call. some people had cooler patients, like a drunk woman, or delirious homeless man, or dehydrated high school student, or broken leg.
tis all, test is tomorrow and saturday. wish me luck.