Hastings, you are right, it's not a popular choice.. to work an infant in rigor. 1 year old, 30 year old, 80 year old should all be treated the same. If you have an 80 y/o in rigor.. has been dead overnight. Cold and stiff you would hook up the AED start compressions and give appropriate tx according to your level of care? If the answer is No than it should be the same for the infant.
By working the rigor infant you are, as said before, providing a false hope to that parents. Imagine this: you are called to a residence at 06:00 for an "unresponsive infant" you arrive to find the parents freaking out and the dad attempting to breath for the infant. You approach, take over and assess the infant. Cold, stiff, and blue. You ask the parents if they witnessed the baby stop breathing.. they say "no, we put her/him to bed at __:__pm and he/she never cried throughout the night, my wife went in about 10 minutes ago to feed him/her and she/he wasn't breathing!" You have an infant that, by what you, a medical professional has seen, is a long dead baby now in rigor.
So you have two options:
A. Work the p/t - give a false hope that there baby can be revived. You start CPR and hook up the AED, and either call for ALS or transport to the hospital. All along parents hope are rising, thinking they will have a baby they can take back home. Only to have their hopes CRUSHED again by ALS or a Doc. Now they.. again, have to face the fact that their baby is dead (this time of course it will be a lot harder for them) and they then get a major bill in the mail for all your tx's.
B. You like Emtgirl said: wrap the baby up in his/her blanket with a stuffed animal (if available.. don't go searching thru the house), sit the parents down and explain to them there was nothing that could have been done.
Yes, B is a lot harder to do. You have to tell the parents straight up that their baby is dead. But it is more ethically correct.
You and I both know that an infant, or anyone for that matter, in rigor is beyond saving. We know that, and if you don't you need to go back to school. If you cannot tell the difference between long dead and no hope vs. recently dead and still hope.. than your ticket needs to be pulled and you need to re visit school. Not to be rude or attack you, but this is a serious issue that needs to be corrected. I have learnt things from this site, and I have changed the way I do things because of awesome paramedics in here that have kicked by butt on an issue.
Lividity and rigidity - p/t has no hope. Regardless of age. Don't offer a false hope by working this code. Deal with the issue, be a medical professional and tell the parents.
Is it hard? HECK YES! Do I enjoy telling parents that their infant is dead and there is nothing we can do? HECK NO. Will I do it, despite how hard it is because it is the right thing to do? HECK YES. Will I allow parents to force me to do CPR and other tx's? HECK NO. If they scene becomes not safe I will leave until a LEO arrives.
Seriously think about what we have been saying and what you do. Don't be offended and put your guard down, and really think about it. Families could really benifit from you possibly changing the way you work a rigor infant.
Take care,
Mitch
:beerchug::beerchug:
