JPINFV
Gadfly
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I also don't see why allot of people are so against fire medics
Example on why having fire medics is plain idiotic:
-Paramedics Activate Cath Lab for STEMI Patients in Some Areas, EMS Insider February 2007 Vol. 25 Issue 2. http://www.jems.com/news_and_articles/articles/Paramedics_Activate_Cath_Lab_STEMI_Patients.htmlBoston EMS has taught its 62 paramedics to interpret an ECG "manually"; and in a study, they performed as well as a "blinded" emergency physician and a cardiologist who reviewed their prehospital ECG readings (Feldman JA, Brinsfield K, Bernard S, et al: "Real-time paramedic compared with blinded physician identification of ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction: Results of an observational study. American Journal of Emergency Medicine. 23[4]:443-448, 2005).
"But we have 2,500 paramedics [and 27 provider agencies] in L.A. County," Rokos said, "And obviously we can't train everyone to read ECGs." So Los Angeles County has paramedics rely on an automated computer ECG interpretation. "All they have to do is read ***Acute MI, and that's their ticket to go," he said.
Guess which system has the fire medics? Would you trust a fire fighter to have your back when going into a structure fire if you knew that the only reason he was a fire fighter was to work EMS and actively avoided anything remotely fire related?
Example 2:
Who is one of the major opponents of advancing requriments for paramedics? If you answered "the fire service," you're correct.
-International Association of Fire Chiefs, Re: Formal Comments on the National EMS Education Standards, Draft 1.0, http://www.iafc.org/associations/4685/files/ems_NtlEMSeduStandardsSectionComments070731.pdfThe IAFC EMS Section expresses concern regarding the following points in the draft education standards:
• The IAFC EMS Section would like to see substantiation on why there is an increase in training hours and how the new hour level was determined.
• While the IAFC EMS Section supports higher education and the aim of increased professionalism in EMS, it is concerned that the general move toward college-based courses, the increase in hours and resulting financial impact will adversely affect departments’ ability (especially volunteer departments) to meet the goals of the standards.
So, essentially his points are:
1. The average fire fighter is too stupid to require more hours.
2. The average fire fighter is too stupid to complete college courses.
3. The current requirement (110 hours (NHTSA, and thus NREMT, standard per National Standard Curriculum) for EMT-B and a suggested 900 or so hours for EMT-P) is enough training and education. (if you actually think that 110 hours is enough please start a thread, I'd be happy to discuss this there).
Yes, I have a problem with systems that put having more numbers and more useless trucks (hey, I bet if you had as many ambulances as fire engines that the "benefit" of having the fire department respond would go away quickly and yes, a fire engine on a medical call is about as useful as having a tow truck at a structure fire) above providing good patient care and higher standards.