Attending ad-nausea

[ttoude]

I did my first long distance inter-facility, ABQ to ELP 4 hours and 36 minutes into the trip I'm gettin a second set of vitals and i notice that the painted shoulder line on the road outside the rear window had a strange wiggle to it as we rolled down the street. Then i noticed sweat beadin on my forearms the my head. Suddenly the dizzies. What the heck do I do 3 more hours to go to till El Paso!!!

I looked out the back window again and the line in the in the road looked more like Jim Morrison and Picasso had a baby then let Then Let Tim Burton teach that kid how to finger paint at woodstock. Yeah it was bad.

I noticed that when I looked away from the window the S/S began to resolve. I thought "could I be getting car sick?" YES, I was!!!!

Is car sickness common in EMS?
Any tips on how to deal with it?
Is it the traveling backwards thing?
I've NEVER gotten carsick before

 

[lightsandsirens5]

Is car sickness common in EMS?
Any tips on how to deal with it?
Is it the traveling backwards thing?

1) I don't know about common, but fairly frequent. I get nausea and slight dizziness quite often.

2) If it donsent freak the pt out and it is a long trip like your's, O2. I have used it on me before on busy runs (major trauma) with a 1 hour transport time. Usually though you just gotta suck it up and keep going. If you get sick you get sick. Just try to be quiet, especally if the pt in conscious.

3) It can happen to me anytime I'm in the box. Forward, backward, sideways. Sometimes I'm fine even on the long long trips and sometimes it hits me even on short ones. Not too long ago, we went on a short "in-town" run, 3-4 minute transport time and I felt horrible. Then we finished up and went 45 minutes out of town and I was fine the whole way back.

 

[EMTinNEPA]

My first day with my former department, I couldn't help on the third call of the day because I was too busy throwing up outside the nursing home.

 

[flhtci01]

The last time it happened to me was when I was riding third. I was in back looking forward and getting sick. It took me a while before I realized that it was because I was seeing the driver's reflection in the box's door. Everytime it looked like he was turning right, we would go left and vice versa. Once I knew what was happening I was fine.

 

[Shishkabob]

Heh, MY embarrassing moment has to do with 3 hours of sleep, no breakfast, and watching a probe go in to a neck stab wound.

 

[johnrsemt]

never gotten car sick, even now when I work in an area that we go through a winding mountain pass to get to the hospital.

question for the OP: 4 1/2 hours into transport and you are only then getting your SECOND set of v/s? everywhere I have ever worked we did minumun of 1 set every 15 min for stable patients; and every 5-10 for unstable patients.

how do you know if your patient is having problems if you are only going to take 3 sets of vitals on a 7-8 hour transport? scary

 

[ttoude]

never gotten car sick, even now when I work in an area that we go through a winding mountain pass to get to the hospital.

question for the OP: 4 1/2 hours into transport and you are only then getting your SECOND set of v/s? everywhere I have ever worked we did minumun of 1 set every 15 min for stable patients; and every 5-10 for unstable patients.

how do you know if your patient is having problems if you are only going to take 3 sets of vitals on a 7-8 hour transport? scary

Well sir I'm glad to hear that your perfect and have never seen a problem. WAIT, I do see one chink in your armour, Grammar. Specificly internet grammar.

I'm not real happy about it but the rules for web typing. But I do frequently for-go the spell check and read thru in the interest of time.

"distance inter-facility, ABQ to ELP 4 hours
(Should have put a period here to satisfy your need to spell check and judge people you dont know. Then you'd see my original intent 36 min into the run on the second set of vitals... My bad)
and 36 minutes into the trip I'm gettin a second set of vit"

I wonder if you could say "Never gotten sick" With the "Slow" doctor during a 3 hour autopsy on 16 y/o shooting victim that sat in a park for four days partially buried so the maggots only got the waist up part of his body.

At any rate have a good day.

 

[NolaRabbit]

Dramamine is your friend! I take one before every shift.

 

[Tincanfireman]

I used to do a lot of IFT's, ranging from 45 minutes to several hours. A couple things that helped me was to keep the back nice and chilly if possible; give the pt an extra blanket if they get cold but always titrate the T-stat in favor of the patient if it becomes an issue, of course. Second thing was to never look at the road, nearby scenery, etc; looking off into the distance when looking outside the vehicle seemed to help quite a bit. If possible, stay away from the caffeine, too; stick with la agua (if nothing else, it doesn't taste as bad coming back up...lol)

 

[johnrsemt]

thank you for clarifying the time on the vitals.

your right: I have never gotten car sick on transports; and so far (although I have came close); never gotten sick in any other way: Yet.

 

[TransportJockey]

Wait... ABQ to EP? Mesilla valley run in a van with red stripes?

Either way, I've done that trip and gotten a little car sick sitting in the airway chair at night. If it's during the day I'm fine. Glad I got to take one of the companies boxes to Denver from ABQ though, a van woulda been mighty cramped