Are you Volunteer or Paid?

[VFFforpeople]

I am a vollie, about to start medic on wed. I am working in to getting into the paid system, but will never leave my vollie station until forced to. We all are trying to do the same job with the same goal. Paid or vollie. Some areas can't afford full time or paid people. My area has 12 paid SAR (already hired SO, just expanded duties). The rest all vollies. It just depends on your tax base that is decide if you have more paid or vollie (yes I know there are other factors). Like for profit hospitals, ect. In relation to SAR it is tax based.

 

[Miss Xina]

I am a vollie, about to start medic on wed. I am working in to getting into the paid system, but will never leave my vollie station until forced to. We all are trying to do the same job with the same goal. Paid or vollie. Some areas can't afford full time or paid people. My area has 12 paid SAR (already hired SO, just expanded duties). The rest all vollies. It just depends on your tax base that is decide if you have more paid or vollie (yes I know there are other factors). Like for profit hospitals, ect. In relation to SAR it is tax based.

Would you consider me a volunteer seeing as I am fully licensed but doing ride time for experience?

 

[downunderwunda]

atkinsje,

I find your responses disturbing, ill informed & poorly considered. I will address them in your summary.

Also more generally my post may have been misleading as I didn't mean to make the US a special case (but as the US health care system was the shifting topic why would I talk about others?).

How can you say that when you stated

We have the worst lifestyle in the world (which isn't considered in the WHO statistics) its a miracle our life expectancy is where it's at period. Altering the health care system may correct the infant mortality rate (though in reality the same number of babies would be dieing they just wouldn't get included in the numbers like other countries), but more access to health care is not going to correct lifestyle.

in your original post?

I think the WHO statics are poor for comparisons of any country (they are good for seeing progress in that country).

So how do you suggest we get comparisons, trends & projections? Like it or not there are similarities between all first world countries, & those trends can be seen through WHO reporting.

When comparing the effectiveness of medical care you have to be on even playing ground (how seriously would you take medical research that didn't have a similar patient base?),

I am assuming from this that you believe that the pathophysiology of illness/disease is different for the US than any other country. Why is it that many medical research projects, regardless of the country of origin, collaberate to conduct sampling worldwide? Could it be that the pathophys is the same worldwide????????

I used cancer because as I said it eliminates some of the lifestyle factors.

Most cancer treatments are similar worldwide, because they follow evidence based practice. Early detection of cancer is shown to be the most important factor in sucessful treatment.

Three of top five causes of death in the US are lifestyle induced for the most part.

Interestingly the top 5 include trauma, however that aside, the per capita numbers are surprisingly similar for most first world countries, Heart Disease, Stroke, Cancer & respiritory disease. So why should the US be discounted?

Do you really not believe this alters life expectancy figures?

No, I dont, however WHO in conjunction with federal health departments worldwide can see trends & look at what stratergies for better education can be implemented to help reduce the problem.

No where did I mention that the US is superior to anyone, my only point was that the effectiveness of US health care is not as bad as the WHO stats make it out to be.

WHO set baseline standards for reporting of figures. These are the same for all countries. Where there are studies & trials being conducted, statistical allowances are made & notes are made in the statistical tables explaining the anomoly.

This all becomes a problem when people try to make the case for a national health care system by comparing us to the rest of world using WHO stats because what works there may not work here.

How do you know a nationalised socialised healthcare system wont work? Oddly enough it works in countries such as France, The UK, Aussie & many, many others. It can work. The provision of healthcare that is the same for all regardles of sociaoeconomic status will always be open for debate, but to make comments like you have, without entering into proper, considered debate, with irrational statments like you have made, is a nonsense.

 

[VentMedic]

Originally Posted by VentMedic
Have you ever actually looked up for a fact what WHO compares for infant mortality?

Not sure what your getting at in your first paragraph. I said nothing about any of this. I'm talking about what countries currently do.

I made that statement after reading the post below. You should familarize yourself with how the factors are determined and what statistical significane means in the studies.

I love it when people try to compare health care systems with the WHO statistics. They are meaningless. You want to compare health care systems? Compare treatment of disease processes that are similar no matter the county (cancer for example). You can't compare US to any other county in infant mortality because we attempt to resuscitate babies we probably shouldn't, skews the numbers in a negative way. Same with life expectancy. We have the worst lifestyle in the world (which isn't considered in the WHO statistics) its a miracle our life expectancy is where it's at period. Altering the health care system may correct the infant mortality rate (though in reality the same number of babies would be dieing they just wouldn't get included in the numbers like other countries), but more access to health care is not going to correct lifestyle. People change because they want to, not because a doctor tells them too (anyone care to look at successful number of smoking cessation because the doctor says to? it isn't a good number).

As for the smoking cessation, I would read more journals than just one and you might try those that specialize in Pulmonary medicine or the stats from the ATS.

Family practice doctors will suggest that a patient quits smoking while they are there to get their BP checked and then refer to a Pulmonologist for a follow up for respiratory issues. The Pulmonologist will then send the patient to a PFT lab where the employees in that lab will initiate counseling during the testing. The physician will then start to hammer it home when he/she has black and white results that paint a picture of the person's lungs. The patient will then be seen to further counseling while starting treatment for pulmonary disease and they will be closely monitored during each visit for followup testing. My CO-OX machine will catch them if they have been smoking during the previous few hours. The Pulmonologist can also tell them they may not be eligible for certain surgeries that are not deemed emergent or even if they are, the patient may be in a high risk group which limits their options.

So, there are specialists that know how to do smoking cessation and get results. GPs may not want to make like the bad guy and lose a patient.

 

[Dwindlin]

Thread was locked for a short time already. So downunder if you want to continue this conversation checks your PMs.

 

[downunderwunda]

Thread was locked for a short time already. So downunder if you want to continue this conversation checks your PMs.

Negative.

Maybe this should be split into another tread to continue the discussion.

I am still to see a reasonable argument from you other than inane ramblings.

Wunda

PS, why are you only addressing this to me, it would appear Vent has issue with some of the things you are dribbling as well.

 

[Miss Xina]

Negative.

Maybe this should be split into another tread to continue the discussion.

I am still to see a reasonable argument from you other than inane ramblings.

Wunda

PS, why are you only addressing this to me, it would appear Vent has issue with some of the things you are dribbling as well.

I have toothache :sad:

 

[Medic One]

Paid for 20yrs but did have a short 4 or 5 year run as a volunteer but with working 40+ hrs a week paid and the volly politics/ required time I dropped vol side of my life.

Volunteering is good tho...helps communities that are less fortunate financially and give a good feeling in the heart.