What do you do to "put it away"?
Left from the hospital on a car v bicycle. 13 min to on scene which sucked. Local VFD was only 30 sec in front of us so no early help.
9yom, bilateral tib/fib fx blood from nose and ears and unconscious the whole time.(no helmet) Bystanders had rolled him over as he was "purple". BP 100/p, P124, SAT 74%, ETCO2 54.
I missed the tube on the first try because of the bright sun and the blood filling his mouth. Suction twice,finally got a combi tube. My partner missed the IV first try, holed a big AC and switched to the other arm. He probably should have IO'ed the kids shoulder but nobody practices it enough to be real comfortable. ( and wouldn't you know both legs were shot).
We finally got him stable and flew him out to the trauma center. The call was seriously f*%# up from the start and we hated our overall performance. Didn't make any difference that his fate was sealed when his gourd hit the asphalt.
This was the first call I went home early off shift in 27 years. Not because it was a kid, had plenty and will have plenty more. But because the call went south and we didn't get it fixed fast enough.
Lessons learned include being better prepared but also that going home was a really good idea. I was asleep by 11pm at home and I never do that. The next day every muscle in my body hurt. It would not have paid to keep pumping epi into myself all night long with other calls.
The next day a long motorcycle ride allowed me to think things through and make adjustments to my thinking without having buried it during the shift. You never stop learning and finding things you didn't know or couldn't do better.
What do others do to de-stress? Fishing? Other bikers? Walks?
FFmedic
