Paramedic (Associates Degree)

Loved my Anatomy. My school receives a fresh male and female each semester. In lucked out and got the head and neck as my concentration. Getting the brain and spine out in one piece with eyes still attached was one of the most tedious tasks I've had yet.
 
The success of people who never completed or attended college makes us question whether what we need to learn is taught in school. Learning by doing -- in life, not classrooms -- is the best way to turn constant iteration into true innovation. We can be productive members of society without submitting to academic or corporate institutions.

To people who believe having an Associates automatically makes a Paramedic degree go from a trade to a profession, you are sadly mistaken. Paramedic is and will always be a trade and you shouldn't feel like that’s a bad thing. I really wish people would stop complaining about it being a trade. Trade in my mind is a profession. You really want paramedic to be a 100,000 dollar loan for college.


I agree with a lot of you. Although, I still feel strongly that Paramedic course needs to adapt to the changing world as dose normal pre-regs.


To people who are attacking me, saying I scare you as a “Engineer”. Let me make this very clear to you. My life on this forum, is a glimpse of who I am. Words reflect nothing of someone until you truly meet them in person. So please attack my opinion, but don't attack me as a individual I haven't done anything to deserve criticism on my career, only my opinion on this matter.
 
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Scoobydooz said:
The success of people who never completed or attended college makes us question whether what we need to learn is taught in school. Learning by doing -- in life, not classrooms -- is the best way to turn constant iteration into true innovation. We can be productive members of society without submitting to academic or corporate institutions.
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Exceptions to the rule...Just because of a few examples of people being successful without formal education does not negate the value of education.

I know my bachelors degree has made me a better clinician and a more productive member of society, not only in my career field but in general life. Disagree all you like.

So should Doctors not go to school? How do you think research works? How are new drugs, procedures, etc developed?
 
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Scoobydooz said:
To people who believe having an Associates automatically makes a Paramedic degree go from a trade to a profession, you are sadly mistaken. Paramedic is and will always be a trade and you shouldn't feel like that’s a bad thing. I really wish people would stop complaining about it being a trade. Trade in my mind is a profession. You really want paramedic to be a 100,000 dollar loan for college.
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I could care less if it is an AA, BA, BS, MS, or even a PhD. 1000 hours for a paramedic is nowhere near enough. You either add more education or drop doing any ALS. The honest answer is you don't need ALS skills :)

Seriously. You'll save just as many patients being an EMT, or even better just stay at a HeartSaver First Aid CPR/AED. You honestly will be in a better position to help patients if you don't want the additional education.

If you'd like your paramedics to be taught in the way of welders, what you're saying is you really want stretcher jockeys (no offense to welders, they do good work). It isn't worth the time and money to teach any skills beyond CPR and AED. Simple economics.

The problem with "learning as you go" in medicine is you do more harm than good along the way. We're smart enough now to know this isn't the right way to "teach" medicine.

We don't have near enough competent paramedics to instruct the next generation anyways. Most have realized that we weren't given nearly enough education to do what we've been asked to do well. So we clamor for the next generation to come into the field with more education.

Scoobydooz said:
I agree with a lot of you. Although, I still feel strongly that Paramedic course needs to adapt to the changing world as dose normal pre-regs.
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It is adapting, by raising the bar with more educational requirements. What you don't know will kill somebody in this job.

Scoobydooz said:
To people who are attacking me, saying I scare you as a “Engineer”. Let me make this very clear to you. My life on this forum, is a glimpse of who I am. Words reflect nothing of someone until you truly meet them in person. So please attack my opinion, but don't attack me as a individual I haven't done anything to deserve criticism on my career, only my opinion on this matter.
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Fair enough, and I apologize for that.

There just isn't much of a difference to the practice of engineering and the practice of medicine. A cavalier attitude in medicine isn't an approach which will garner much success.
 
I would agree on the 1000 hour not being enough.


I guess my argument really is. I believe when you want to be a paramedic, you go to school to be a paramedic. Like lets make a curriculum based off paramedic. Focus all the important aspects out of A&P and put it into one class.


People argue that with Engineering, I had pre-regs its true a lot of math, which I use to this very day. So it was relevant.

Maybe I'll see a different light when I finish Paramedic, but as of now I just don't see how knowing every part of the human body will be beneficial. I mean I've already forgotten a ton out of my A&P.

What we can all agree with, is that we are here to help people. So with that, thank you for your guys points of views I've learned a great deal. Thank you
 
Scoobydooz said:
I would agree on the 1000 hour not being enough.


I guess my argument really is. I believe when you want to be a paramedic, you go to school to be a paramedic. Like lets make a curriculum based off paramedic. Focus all the important aspects out of A&P and put it into one class.


People argue that with Engineering, I had pre-regs its true a lot of math, which I use to this very day. So it was relevant.

Maybe I'll see a different light when I finish Paramedic, but as of now I just don't see how knowing every part of the human body will be beneficial. I mean I've already forgotten a ton out of my A&P.

What we can all agree with, is that we are here to help people. So with that, thank you for your guys points of views I've learned a great deal. Thank you
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Saying "Oh, I'll probably never need to understand this part of medicine" is what keeps our profession as a trade. Paramedicine is medicine, even if you operate within protocols. If you don't understand the basics of medicine, why are you being trusted to utilize some potentially very dangerous drugs?

I've worked with basics whose understanding of drug effects was well below minimal (One tried to explain how Zofran worked to a patient and used the phrase "Doctors don't even know how it works"), I've worked with paramedics who advocated against taking temperatures in the field because we have no interventions to bring down a fever. That is not good medicine. That's what happens when you just teach cookbook understanding of skills without the theory to back it up. You can teach a monkey to intubate or start an IV. A medical professional should understand why a procedure is performed, how it effects the body as a whole, and how it treats the symptoms.
 
Scoobydooz said:
Learning by doing -- in life, not classrooms -- is the best way to turn constant iteration into true innovation. We can be productive members of society without submitting to academic or corporate institutions.
Click to expand...
While I completely agree that academia in this country has seriously lost sight of what it's here for, that doesn't mean that education is not necessary. Medicine is not something that can be learned exclusively on the job. I can't sit on shift and explain why epinephrine is not always an appropriate treatment option for allergic reaction or what the difference in anaphylaxis and allergic reaction is, because I expect you to step onto my ambulance as a paramedic student understanding what histamine is, what mast cells are, and how hypersensitivity reactions come to take place. That is what school is for.
Scoobydooz said:
To people who believe having an Associates automatically makes a Paramedic degree go from a trade to a profession, you are sadly mistaken. Paramedic is and will always be a trade and you shouldn't feel like that’s a bad thing. I really wish people would stop complaining about it being a trade. Trade in my mind is a profession.
Click to expand...
Actually I completely agree that an associates doesn't make this job a profession, it'll take a lot more that just an academic piece of paper to make paramedicine a profession. A wonderful place to start would be the attitudes of providers, followed by employers.

We are not nurses, however it is a good profession to look at for guidance on where we should go. Nurses started out as a low paying job reserved for the poor and underclass of the world, with education and organization within the profession, initiated by the profession, has evolved nursing into the career it is today.

You might want paramedicine to be a trade, I will say that you are certainly not alone in this opinion. In fact I would say the vast majority of our "trade" agrees with you. However you picked the wrong forum to have this opinion on, the majority of us here want this to be more than a job, some of us wish it to be a little more like nursing, a career.

As far as people attacking you, well, unfortunately that is the nature of forums with strongly opinionated people. I don't think any of us truly believe you are a bad provider, or a bad engineer (to be fair only 1-2 people in this thread can express any opinion about the attitudes required of engineers, I won't judge because I'm not smart enough to be an engineer anyway). I personally think you are misinformed about the nature of being a paramedic, and maybe with some experience and time as a paramedic you'll change your opinion, maybe not. I encourage you to take some time to look at paramedics in Australia, UK, South Africa, New Zealand and Canada. Also review the history of Nursing and see how far they have come in a relatively short time. Good luck in Paramedic school.
 
The people who excel at sciences without the aid of formal education are very few and far between. They are also classified as genius's more often than not...

The founders of science also excelled in their fields because there was no one before them to tell them they were wrong. There is simply too much information you must learn prior now, then there was back then. You cannot simply re-write what we know about medicine. You need to be taught what others already know so that you can then build upon your footings.

Business, I will give you that. It is absolutely more than possible to become with a good business sense and not attend college. Still, it is less than preferable.
 
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rescue1 said:
I've worked with paramedics who advocated against taking temperatures in the field because we have no interventions to bring down a fever. That is not good medicine.
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Amusingly, I was attacked on this forum for having that opinion when I first joined the forum. It's funny how a little bit of school changed my opinion on that. You don't know what you don't know... Granted, now my problem is I can never get our stupid temporal thermometers to work well, "Do I drag it over the forehead and jump behind the ear, do I have to trace it all the way?" I should probably read the manual. :lol:
 
sir.shocksalot said:
Amusingly, I was attacked on this forum for having that opinion when I first joined the forum. It's funny how a little bit of school changed my opinion on that. You don't know what you don't know... Granted, now my problem is I can never get our stupid temporal thermometers to work well, "Do I drag it over the forehead and jump behind the ear, do I have to trace it all the way?" I should probably read the manual. :lol:
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Those work by opening the box and putting them directly into the trash I think (you then write down 97.4 F if their forehead is cool and 101.4 F if it is hot).

An interesting parallel to this thread is when I tutor students in calculus I have found those that struggle the most, or those that decry the usefulness of calculus, are the ones who failed to learn one of its under-appreciated prerequisites...Algebra.
 
Christopher said:
Those work by opening the box and putting them directly into the trash I think (you then write down 97.4 F if their forehead is cool and 101.4 F if it is hot).

An interesting parallel to this thread is when I tutor students in calculus I have found those that struggle the most, or those that decry the usefulness of calculus, are the ones who failed to learn one of its under-appreciated prerequisites...Algebra.
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I'm convinced that you are just excellent at anything involving numbers or graph paper...
 
Chase said:
You seem to like that quote a lot :P

If you add all my science labs together I think I would be getting close.

I am thinking about taking a few Grad / Advanced science classes to improve my resume, hopefully I can find a Gross Anatomy with Lab.
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It is not that I like the quote.

It is more like remembering being molested. 4 consecutive semesters of human gross is not a pleasant experience. It is probably a crime against humanity.

But I did learn there is no way a backboard will work from it.
 
rescue1 said:
. A medical professional should understand why a procedure is performed, how it effects the body as a whole, and how it treats the symptoms.
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and when it should not be performed, most importantly.
 
Scoobydooz said:
Why?
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Because it will greatly enhance your ability to critically think about the disease process affection your patient and how the treatments you are providing will alter the bodies normal physiologic processes affecting the aforementioned disease.

prior to my formal Paramedic education I completed:

Gross Human Anatomy with cadaver dissection
Human Physiology
Biology
Microbiology
Pharmacology
Pathophysiology

While I do not currently hold an AS in paramedicine I could pay $500 to have my credits certified and degree granted. I feel as though my education prior to medic school allowed me a much greater understanding of what was being taught and how my treatments will affect my patients. I feel that all the classes listed above should be mandatory for all paramedics regardless of degree status.

full disclosure: while I am a full advocate of requiring a Bachelors degree prior to licensing as a paramedic, I am in fact a hypocrite as I do not yet have a bachelors degree. I am however chipping away at 9units/semester in order the remedy this.
 
sir.shocksalot said:
Amusingly, I was attacked on this forum for having that opinion when I first joined the forum. It's funny how a little bit of school changed my opinion on that. You don't know what you don't know... Granted, now my problem is I can never get our stupid temporal thermometers to work well, "Do I drag it over the forehead and jump behind the ear, do I have to trace it all the way?" I should probably read the manual. :lol:
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They just got those at the service I just left, so I have no idea how effective they are. The oral ones we used were fine, but I poked patients in the face with them more then once if we hit a bump while taking a temp.
 
rescue1 said:
They just got those at the service I just left, so I have no idea how effective they are. The oral ones we used were fine, but I poked patients in the face with them more then once if we hit a bump while taking a temp.
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I'm a big fan of ear thermometers, myself. They'll get you in the right ballpark (normal vs. fever) and take all of two seconds to get a reading.
 
Scoobydooz said:
To people who believe having an Associates automatically makes a Paramedic degree go from a trade to a profession, you are sadly mistaken. Paramedic is and will always be a trade and you shouldn't feel like that’s a bad thing. I really wish people would stop complaining about it being a trade. Trade in my mind is a profession. You really want paramedic to be a 100,000 dollar loan for college.
Click to expand...

I don't think anyone said a degree requirement would automatically make Paramedicine a profession...but it is a step in the right direction.

A 4 year degree doesn't always cost 100,000 dollars...

A huge problem with EMS in the US is the oversaturation of the job market. Some places hurt for medics and EMTs but in lots of places you can't throw a rock without bouncing it off of a number of people who are EMT or Paramedic certified because, lets face it, the schooling is pretty damn easy.

I'd love to spend my career working as a single roll paramedic but making ~40k/yr isn't going to cut it down the road when I want to have and support a family unless I work a ton of overtime or multiple jobs.
 
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