socalmedic
Mediocre at best
- 789
- 8
- 18
I am a fan of the Fire Medic retaining care on critical calls if they have already provided interventions or gotten the majority of the information gathered. from a patient care standpoint information will not as easily be lost or forgotten and there will be less of a delay in transporting because time will not be wasted giving me report. besides it gives me time during the transport to get a head start on my documentation.
as an example, I recently had a stroke patient who the fire medic was on scene of for about 5 min prior to my arrival. I then got the gurney ready for the patient so he had the patient for about 10 minutes prior to giving me report. the report I got was unknown downtime, unwitnessed event, the patient was non-verbal. we treated as such, transported non-emergent and gave report as unknown downtime. family later told the hospital that the downtime was only 40 minutes. it turns out that they had told the fire medic this as well and it was either not communicated to me or I didn't hear it. However this discovery was too late for TPA and it ended up being a sentinel event. had the fire medic transported with me this information would have gotten to the doctor and proper treatment could have been provided. this is why I like the first medic on scene to retain care for sick patients.
as an example, I recently had a stroke patient who the fire medic was on scene of for about 5 min prior to my arrival. I then got the gurney ready for the patient so he had the patient for about 10 minutes prior to giving me report. the report I got was unknown downtime, unwitnessed event, the patient was non-verbal. we treated as such, transported non-emergent and gave report as unknown downtime. family later told the hospital that the downtime was only 40 minutes. it turns out that they had told the fire medic this as well and it was either not communicated to me or I didn't hear it. However this discovery was too late for TPA and it ended up being a sentinel event. had the fire medic transported with me this information would have gotten to the doctor and proper treatment could have been provided. this is why I like the first medic on scene to retain care for sick patients.
That's good to hear their not going to try the same thing. I don't get the whole thing about jumping in the back of the private ambulance to continue care when you already have a paramedic transporting, it's not hard to give them all the info they got but that's just a opinion. If they work together well then great for them.