Ride Along Anxiety

BubblegumRip

Forum Ride Along
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1
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Hey there, so tomorrow I’m having a my first ride along in an ambulance. I’m extremely nervous, and scared. I’m not an EMT, this ambulance service offers classes and asks you to do a ride along before attending. I’ve never been in an ambulance, much less worked one. I’m sure I’m not going to be expected to know much, but they did talk about having tasks they might ask you to do. They also made it very clear that you are a representative of their company - respectable, I’m not complaining. Either way, I want to be productive, I want to learn, and I don’t want to be in the way. I’ve never worked a twelve hour shift in my life, and I’m scared about fatigue. Do you have any tips to help my nerves?
 

Jim37F

Forum Deputy Chief
4,300
2,875
113
Wear clean clothes according to whatever dress code they prescribed (when I was in LA, all the ride alongs were supposed to wear white collared shirts, polo style, dark slacks, black shoes, preferably safety toe boots if you have 'em). Show up early ready to help do shift change checks so when shift officially starts you're ready to roll right away if needed. Bring something like a box of donuts or ice cream or whatever with you. Bring some sort of EMT study book so in between calls and other downtime when you're not talking with the crew or helping with chores or whatev you can be doing something more productive than playing on your phone.

Be prepared to act within your scope/level of training (especially if they also run your training they should know exactly what they want you to do... whether that's a near graduating EMT doing full BLS assessments or just a Day 1 (day 0?) student only watching/listening, even then you can still be expected to help lift/carry and maybe CPR if needed. Be sure to ask the crew you're working with before you actually get a call. In my experience it's common for the Student ride along to just watch the first call or two and then be slowly eased into whatever role, but be ready for whatever you've learned in class.

Be calm, polite, courteous, treat everyone like they're your future boss, don't talk smack about anyone, even if it's a troublesome patient the crew is b***ing about later don't join in, especially do not do that for other crew. Time for 12+ hours of perfect customer service mode, save venting for after you get home.

But definitely, enjoy yourself.
 

planetmike

Forum Lieutenant
200
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28
If you have questions about something that happens on a call, ask them when the crew is no longer with the patient. You don't want to freak out the patient or the family.

Safety first. If you're on a street, you should have some kind of high visibility vest to wear. If you are at a patient's home and you see/smell/sense something dangerous, say something right then. Guns, drugs, smoke/fire, creepy guy carrying an axe, whatever.

If you don't know how to do something, say so. "Hey new guy, go get the IO drill from the cabinet."

When the report is done after a call, ask if you can read it. There will be a report with lots of checkboxes and drop-down menus, and a long area of text (the narrative). That is all part of the report of the call. That's the only record of what the EMS crew did for the patient. In three years when they (and you) are all sued because of a mistake made on this call, that's the record that will protect you.

Good luck, I hope you have a good time!
 
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