# Police Cadet goes down.



## EMTSteve (Jul 12, 2008)

First let me say my college has EMS Academy, EMT, First Responder, Paramedic Academy, Police Academy, Corrections Academy all on one campus.

I was TA'ing for a First Responder class when a Police Cadet comes running into class and says we got a cadet down in at the firing range.

The Teaher says: Is this for real.

Cadet: Yes!

Teacher: This is not a Scenario?

Cadet: No!

I looked at the students in the class and everyone had shock written on their faces ... lol
The teacher said... "Okay class dismissed.... but if you want to come watch, you are more then welcome to but just stay out of the way".

My teacher (a 25 year paramedic) and I grab a 5min bag and walk over to the firing rage and find a 20 y/o female cadet supine on the floor. 

The teacher (who was my old EMT teacher) looked at me and said get vitals.
So after getting vitals and giving o2 via NRB and doing a rapid assessment. (No GSW). He checked her blood-glucose levels... BINGO.
 At this time she had started to come to. I guess he decided she was conscious enough to get oral glucose.
About the time Fire and EMS arrived, she was fully conscious A&O X4, and agreed to go to the hospital.

It made for great discussion in the next class.


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## volff21 (Jul 12, 2008)

Pa EMT are not aloud to use a glucometer, makes no sense to me,it would answer alot of ??????? quickly when the pt cant


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## firecoins (Jul 12, 2008)

volff21 said:


> Pa EMT are not aloud to use a glucometer, makes no sense to me,it would answer alot of ??????? quickly when the pt cant



NY EMTs can not either but this is changing.  

NYC medics are not required to use them and some ALS rigs don't have them.  One of the remac doctors lecturing at my class gave the impression it is because the remac commitee feels you should already be giving D50.  Apparently 5 seconds for a glucometer is too long.


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## mycrofft (Jul 12, 2008)

*Our man downs on range are cardiacs.*

No glucometry? Crikey-thyrotomy, laypersons can do them. Only drawback in doing them I can see is that in the excitement (and we don't get excited, we get vitals) the finger can be squeezed too hard, causing a droplet which is "diluted" with serum, lymph, or whatever you can wring out of a finger if you gronch down on it too hard, which will affect the reading...but you will probably give sugar anyway.
Cool that the class got to see some mentoring first hand!


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## Jon (Jul 12, 2008)

volff21 said:


> Pa EMT are not aloud to use a glucometer, makes no sense to me,it would answer alot of ??????? quickly when the pt cant


Yep. Pennsultucky is like that. however... the OP states that the instructor is a medic, and that the medic checked BgL... so would be OK even in PA


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## EMTSteve (Jul 12, 2008)

Jon said:


> Yep. Pennsultucky is like that. however... the OP states that the instructor is a medic, and that the medic checked BgL... so would be OK even in PA




Exactly, the teacher who is a Medic checked the glucose levels.

But I agree, EMT-B's should be trained in checking BgL. With a nation that is growing over weight and a vast majority having diabetes.


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## BossyCow (Jul 13, 2008)

volff21 said:


> Pa EMT are not aloud to use a glucometer, makes no sense to me,it would answer alot of ??????? quickly when the pt cant



If they can't use a glucometer aloud, can they do it silently?


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## WuLabsWuTecH (Jul 13, 2008)

Yeah, it was a brief 10 minute lesson in our EMT-B class.  Its not that easy to screw up a reading.  The process was designed for ppl with no medical training whatsoever to be able to use it!


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## daedalus (Jul 13, 2008)

The glucometer thing is beaten to a pulp in many other threads. *IBTL*


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## JPINFV (Jul 13, 2008)

daedalus said:


> The glucometer thing is beaten to a pulp in many other threads. *IBTL*


Aye. To sum this future of a EMT-B BGL monitoring thread.

EMT-Bs: We wanna do it.
EMT-Ps: Sure. Go get your medic cert.
EMT-Bs: Can't because [money, time, effort, etc] but patients neeeeed it, besides it's so easy that children are taught to do it.
EMT-Ps: Why? It doesn't change your treatment.
EMT-Bs: But if we have it we can use it to justify more treatments.
EMT-Ps: You're not gonna get more treatments out of a 110 hour course
EMT-Bs: Well, my [state/course] was [number higher than 110 hours] long, plus I have [insert number of CME hours and/or CME course].
EMT-P: Doesn't matter, NHTSA curriculum is 110 hours, thus NREMT is 110 hours, thus any state honoring NREMT-B is 110 hours.

Sprinkle the above with veiled, thinly veiled, and open personal attacks after marinating with plenty of indignation and arrogance from some of the members of both sides. Ignore anyone making any sort of coherent argument against your chosen side. 

Admin: lock, warnings, now needs a stiff drink

Did I miss anything besides not posting at 4:30 in the morning?


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## MMiz (Jul 13, 2008)

We too shared a building with the police academy and fire academy.  One day local officers were showing off on their bikes, after going through the Bike Police course.  They did this thing where they turned the bike to the side and did a sliding stop.  One by one they did it, creating a line.  Then one guy mucks it up, doesn't do it right, and knocked everyone down.  They didn't want our help.


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## mikie (Jul 13, 2008)

JPINFV said:


> Did I miss anything besides not posting at 4:30 in the morning?



Yup.....you posted it at 3:33.  nice timing


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## JPINFV (Jul 13, 2008)

mikie333 said:


> Yup.....you posted it at 3:33.  nice timing



Different time zones. All post times are displayed in the timezone set in the preferences. I'm gonna bet your's is set to central time (CDT)


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## gradygirl (Jul 13, 2008)

WuLabsWuTecH said:


> Yeah, it was a brief 10 minute lesson in our EMT-B class.  Its not that easy to screw up a reading.  The process was designed for ppl with no medical training whatsoever to be able to use it!



Do you dry the finger before taking the reading or not? The residual alcohol from the prep pad can mess up our glucometers.


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## mikie (Jul 13, 2008)

JPINFV said:


> Different time zones. All post times are displayed in the timezone set in the preferences. I'm gonna bet your's is set to central time (CDT)



my bad.  your good with guess the timezones


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## Monroe485-281 (Jul 17, 2008)

EMTSteve said:


> she was fully conscious A&O X4,
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## MMiz (Jul 17, 2008)

Monroe485-281 said:


> EMTSteve said:
> 
> 
> > she was fully conscious A&O X4,
> ...


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## reaper (Jul 17, 2008)

A&Ox4 is full mental status check. Anything below 4 is a form of AMS. Everyone should be oriented to Person,Place,Time and Event.


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## EMTSteve (Jul 20, 2008)

I work for a transport company and 98% of the people we pick up get rides like 3 to 4 times a week for Dialysis and I can tell most of them get pretty irritated from the standard A&O questions.

What's your full name?
Do you know where you are?
What day of the week is it?
Who is the president of the United States?

I'm still working on a more simple way of just asking 2 or 3 questions to get an accurate A&O.


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## Megs_h13 (Aug 14, 2008)

firecoins said:


> NY EMTs can not either but this is changing.
> 
> NYC medics are not required to use them and some ALS rigs don't have them.  One of the remac doctors lecturing at my class gave the impression it is because the remac commitee feels you should already be giving D50.  Apparently 5 seconds for a glucometer is too long.




Wow I'm actually surprised to hear that in the States as an EMT you are unable to do Bgl's. Across Canada all EMT's can do Bgl's and give oral glucose, and in Alberta EMT's can give D50W.


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## BossyCow (Aug 14, 2008)

This varies from state to state. In our region we not only can but must.


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