RN on ground ambulance?

[TransportJockey]

I guess I'm just being territorial but i don't like the thought of nurses on the units or any kind of transport. Nurses have so many job opportunities and we have a limited amount. After 28 years in the business I thought it would have expanded more but it still just centers around ambulance services. I wish it was different. Not many opportunities out there. Many reasons why I'm sure but that is for another post I think

What have we accomplished to allow us to branch out? Until we require a true education, the more educated medical professionals will edge us out.

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[VFlutter]

I guess I'm just being territorial but i don't like the thought of nurses on the units or any kind of transport. Nurses have so many job opportunities and we have a limited amount. After 28 years in the business I thought it would have expanded more but it still just centers around ambulance services. I wish it was different. Not many opportunities out there. Many reasons why I'm sure but that is for another post I think

Nurse are used in critical care transport because they have shown that their specific experience and expertise can be beneficial in the transport environment. Why do you think paramedics have limited opportunities? What has changed in paramedic education in the past 28 years? Paramedics have proven themselves in many different areas including flight, specificity transport, ER, etc but usually are those who are driven to gain the best experience and training. I am all for advancing Paramedic practice however that has to come from within the profession. You can complain about another profession encroaching on your "territory" but ultimately you have to set up to the plate and compete.

 

[VentMonkey]

Nurse are used in critical care transport because they have shown that their specific experience and expertise can be beneficial in the transport environment. Why do you think paramedics have limited opportunities? What has changed in paramedic education in the past 28 years? Paramedics have proven themselves in many different areas including flight, specificity transport, ER, etc but usually are those who are driven to gain the best experience and training. I am all for advancing Paramedic practice however that has to come from within the profession, and the person; ambition is NOT taught. You can complain about another profession encroaching on your "territory" but ultimately you have to set up to the plate and compete.

I thought to add this, though I do agree with this post. Oftentimes I hear co-workers gripe, and complain still to this this day about pay and advancement, blah blah blah. We as a profession have done an absolutely abysmal job at planning out career-paths. I don't understand why one would be conflicted about opportunities presented to a paramedic outside of an ambulance, or even flight. If it's because you're genuinely interested in another career, or change in career paths, then more power to you. I am not referring to the often quoted retirement, pay, long hours; I am talking about the 30 year paramedics who indoctrinate this thought process to the younger ones, leading them to believe that there is no future in this career path without offering any resolutions while exemplifying minimalism and a self-entitled mindset. Nothing is ever earned without ambition, drive, and self-motivation. This generation is all too often quoted for lacking such life coping skills and work ethic, but what good are we doing them by not showing them by example that it can be done? Nope, we'll just keep on griping blindly instead of effecting change.

Without fully understanding roles such as EMS coordinators, managers, supervisors and the like, we as a whole often scoff at these opportunities. I can't help but wonder what the masses feel about community paramedicine as yet another outlet, or branch for someone who actually wants---isn't forced---off of an ambulance. In short as stated earlier, we do it to ourselves.

I would also love to know how in the long run it would effect the profession and the countless "adrenaline junkie" types if at the beginning of ones EMT or paramedic course they were taught soft-skills, verbal deescalation tactics, or even some common social worker type approaches to the patient as a person. Then, and only then will one be allowed to move on to the limited procedures, and skills that we've deemed "necessary" after 50 or so years of no real hard facts other than citing the "EMS founding fathers" responsible for "bringing the ICU to the patient".

Then again, how cool would this job be if we were found to be the public's form of mobile social work that more often times than not we actually are? Maybe setting ourselves up for a realistic approach from the get go would yield a more realistic approach to what field work truly is. We really haven't deemed ourselves that useful to the public eye as whole, other than ambulance drivers, do we blame them for this?

 

[scotty vidrine]

What have we accomplished to allow us to branch out? Until we require a true education, the more educated medical professionals will edge us out.

Education and politics is where I think, although I may be wrong, where we are lacking as a profession as a whole. There are exceptions around the country. But in Louisiana, basically you work for an ambulance service or maybe offshore but not much after that.