best advice you have ever had or given

Breathe.
 
when all else fails, take the patient to the hospital.

when you have no idea what is going on, and have a patient where nothing makes sense, take the patient to the hospital.

if the patient wants to go to the hospital, even if it's for a reason that warrants neither an ambulance or an ER, just take them. it makes your boss happy, the patient happy, and the billing department happy.

Sometimes it's a whole lot easier to just take them to the hospital than to talk them into a refusal.

you can't get much worse than dead

in 90% of the patients you deal with, your interventions will have no impact on whether or not the patient lives or dies.

don't drop the baby. if you do drop the baby pick it up. and fake a seizure.

If my basic HazMat training has taught me nothing else, it's that if you see a glowing green monkey running away from something, follow that monkey!
 
DrParasite said:
If my basic HazMat training has taught me nothing else, it's that if you see a glowing green monkey running away from something, follow that monkey!
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Why would you want to follow the contaminated animal? Get away from him too! On a related note, the hospital I'm rotating at just had a MCI drill for a mass organophosphate exposure. I was talking to the surgery intern who got suckered into being the physician overseeing the triage area (I worked with her when I was on my surgery rotation), and I mentioned that they were lucky I wasn't running it. Everyone who wasn't in PPE (she was the only one dressed for the occasion) would have immediately become contaminated and patients.
 
Don't waste time as a basic - do medic school as sooner rather than later.

Don't waste time going through each cert level - go from EMT-B right to EMT-P.

Don't fall prey to the income from from a second or third part time job in EMS. After a while, your expenses will match your income, so that you have to work those extra hours just to pay all of your bills. Now you're trapped.

As a corollary to the last point:

Get a degree early on. Many make the mistake of working in EMS, taking extra part time positions, reasoning that they'll go back to school in a few years after they get ahead of some bills, save a few $$$, that sort of thing. Most never go back. The income from the extra hours is enough to sustain them, so the motivation for education is gone. Anything can happen - you can throw out your back, get a disease, get pregnant and have children, then be unable to work full time on shift work (rotating schedule), etc. You need another way to earn income if you can no longer do EMS transport.

Always wear eye protection when intubating.

If bagging, back far away from the pt when they're about to get shocked, so that you don't get sprayed with vomit.

If you can't reach a sharps container, place the sharps on the floor for the time being.

Always use a taped line for conversations with dispatchers and supervisors, not direct connect, so that you have a record of what was said and ordered.

Use the restroom as soon as you think you need to - if you wait, the tones will drop.
 
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46Young said:
Use the restroom as soon as you think you need to - if you wait, the tones will drop.
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Eat when you can, sleep when you can, pee when you can [I never realized that this one was missing]. Don't run when you can walk. Don't stand when you can sit.
 
JPINFV said:
Why would you want to follow the contaminated animal? Get away from him too!
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the reason you follow him because he is probably running away from whatever made him start glowing. do you really want to be going anywhere near whatever made him start glowing? :P if he's running away, than so should you
 
"You clearly had no idea what you were doing back there, but at least you looked confident!"
 
"Never F*** a nurse you do not plan to marry."

Announced every year to new residents.
 
Never miss an opportunity to shut the F&*K up.
 
From an FTO to a new EMT:

"I have three rules for you. First, never take off a homeless person's shoes. Second, when I want your opinion, I will give it to you."

"And what's the third rule?"

"That was three rules, we don't count so good here. You want another rule? Fine: Don't ask so many questions."
 
Received: "Don't go in there".
Given: "Uh, take the BP cuff off the IV arm, the red line is rising..".
 
Always have a reason for doing something. "Protocol" is not a very good one.

Pillows and holding someones hand can do more than you think.

If unsure of what to do next, first think "will this make me look like a toolbag?" If yes, do not do that.
 
Tigger said:
Pillows and holding someones hand can do more than you think.
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:rofl::rofl::rofl:

Especially if you put the pillow over somebody''s face...
 
Veneficus said:
:rofl::rofl::rofl:

Especially if you put the pillow over somebody''s face...
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Hey, in the absence of pain medications I've heard that he euphoria provided by asphyxiation induced hypoxia can take the edge right off of even the most grievous fractures...

I'll be right back with that study.
 
"The less you speak, the smarter you sound." This is what my grandfather told me when I was a know-it-all teenager. Best advice ever.
 
Reminded of this last weekend

Thus is both given and taken.

"They're coming! They're coming!"
"Hey. Stop. Are we ready as we can be?"
"Yeah..."
"Are they here yet?".
"Well, no...".
"Then siddown, you're making people nervous".
 
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