Stupid things you did on your first few calls

[MrBrown]

As long as you learn from your mistakes, you'll be right.

That is what the Coroner keeps telling me

I have done a few dumb things;

- Nobody taught me how to take the stretcher out
- Opening standard tubing instead of a nasal cannula (they do look alike!)
- Not being able to hear a blood pressure
- Leaving 12 lead ECGs and rhythm strips in my pocket
- Not having a swipe card for ED and realising I could have used the side door

Oh then there was that time I got the syringes full of clear liquid mixed up, do label your suxamethonium people

 

[ZVNEMT]

- apply at american ambulance
- accept the job at american ambulance
- left the lights on, but turned the engine off.... killed the battery
- listened to the Senior MFR... who I thought was an EMT.
- trust that my partner was not as stupid as he looked, discovered otherwise.
- continue to work at american ambulance for 2 1/2 years

 

[ExpatMedic0]

on my first paid EMT-B call I put the blood pressure cuff on backwards, inflated to maximum capacity and it poped right off the patients arm.... I did not hear the end of that one for a long time.

 

[MusicMedic]

Things Ive done and sometimes do: (i work for an IFT Company)
1. Get Lost
2. End up at the wrong Pickup address and realize it 10 min before pickup time
3. End up in the wrong Drop off address (done this once)
4. Trip over my own feet
5. Lose Pens (always will do and still do)
6. Try 10 times before getting a Bp reading
7. Feel like an Idiot (always)

 

[MMiz]

Anyone else ever take the wrong patient?

 

[mcdonl]

Anyone else ever take the wrong patient?

Matt, last night I approached the wrong patient... there were 4 or 5 people with the same demographics in the house... they were all frantic so I just picked the sickest looking one...

I was wrong.

Forgetting to ask for med control and asking permission to assist with a drug to the ED phone triage.
Forgot to strap patient in stretcher.
Copy and Pasted one of my first narratives so I would remember everything and reported a 41 year old male with a past history of miscariage.

 

[Prophet]

I am still in the "first calls" but the first thing I have had to learn not to do was treat SAMPLE and OPQRST like a checklist.

 

[vienessewaltzer]

I am still in the "first calls" but the first thing I have had to learn not to do was treat SAMPLE and OPQRST like a checklist.

So do you have any allergies, sir? (ssAmmmm) Oh right, what about any medication? (sssaaammmppp) right! Any pertinent medical history!?

Haha.

I'm terrible at this. Though I have been practicing my patient assessments, this phenomenon still occurs with most of my classmates and I. Also, it's kind of silly to ask "Is there any pertinent medical history?". On some of my recent transports ,some ALS technicians have been very helpful in providing me with profound inquiries patient medical history. One I recently learned was in asthma patients. You can ask them if they've ever been intubated before to assist their breathing due to asthma (then specifying what you mean by intubation, of course). One lady that the paramedic worked with had been intubated 6 times previous to the asthma emergency they responded to which can provide some foreshadowing in the patients condition. I just thought that story was interesting considering generally while practicing these patient assessments we're doing exactly as I stated above...."do you have any pertinent past history?!"

 

[Shishkabob]

Ask if they've been intubated, and if they say yes, ask if this attack is as bad as that previous one.


Hearing a patient who is actively having an asthma attack, and stating that they have been intubated before, is one of the most scary things you'll hear as a provider, along with "I'm going to die" and "We don't have any chicken nuggets left".

 

[mycrofft]

My first run code 3

I let my crew chief talk me into driving too fast for conditions and spun out a few yards from pedestrians and a guard shack on an ice-glazed reverse-banked (banked the wrong way) turn.
His comment " Think you was drivin' fast enough there?".

 

[vienessewaltzer]

Well, I had a call for a patient that went down yesterday. In order to stay brief, we'll just say CPR was initiated and this was my first call where this has happened. I had a few silly blunders, but for the most part it was because I didn't understand the flow of the call. Normally when these scenarios are played out in classes it's only a few people performing the skill, which was different here because fire, ALS, and a couple units from the ambulance were on scene. Therefore, most of the important things were being taken care of until we began transport where I was placed in charge of respiration. This was fine, as I was being coached doing the standard breath every 5-6 seconds (which I knew but was in the heat of the moment and was counting my "mississippis" a little fast). When we got to the hospital is where the biggest blunder was. We rolled the patient into the OR, and were still performing CPR. He did an ultrasound on the patient's heart and checked their pupil reaction. He then looked up at the clock and announced the time. I'm watching him, completely enthralled as to what he's doing (especially the ultrasound) while the whole time in my head counting...1 mississippi....2 mississippi..etc. Well, I didn't realize he was pronouncing the patient, and after he spouted off the time, I squeezed. The doc looked at me and kindly advised me that I could discontinue assisted respiration :blush:. Woops! Not too shabby for the first call like that, though. I definitely won't make similar mistakes when it happens again. I was pretty much the help on this call, but it was a really good learning experience!

 

[Fbarba123]

I work for a BLS ambulance company ( In a dual medic system).

- Grabbed the radio mic instead of the pa mic and yelled stay back!

-Drove a few miles with an the extension cord from the shoreline still hooked up, Won't let that happen again! ahah

-Forgetting to charge gurney batteries, (we have power gurneys) then getting stuck using them manually which sucks because we have to work against all the hydraulic fluid in the lines

-ALMOST put gas into the diesel rig.. that would have been bad. We have gas and diesel rigs

-Gurney didn't lock in place (no patient). Hear it rattling moving all over the place, when I pulled over to lock it in, it locked itself into the latch...

- Going to the wrong hospital, residence, room, for a pick-up (Dispatch, not us)

-Setting off the Siren when locking the rig, the crew before us sets the siren to auto when the horn is activated.. yea I always check for that one now.

- Forgetting to turn on O2 and yelling and going crazy because i think we zero! (No patient on board)

-Not me, but forgetting to turn lights off after a call, radios were blocking out sound of the strobes. wondering why everyone was moving aside, figured out that one quick...!

 

[MMiz]

Fbarba123, I've done quite a few of those.

Anyone else leave the parking break on while driving?

 

[medic417]

Fbarba123, I've done quite a few of those.

Anyone else leave the parking break on while driving?

Nooooooo. And we are letting you drive emtlife why? :blink:

 

[Bloom-IUEMT]

Started CPR on a guy that had been dead for some time. He had obvious livor and rigor mortis.

 

[Bloom-IUEMT]

Annnddd....once forgot to put the Lifepak on the ambulance.

 

[EMT-IT753]

This didn't happen to me directly, but on a call I was on. Our fire/first responder group was called to a person with difficulty breathing. We arrive on scene before the ALS service and start doing our assessment. Patient is a COPD'er and having a real hard time breathing. I went out to the ambulance to get the cot while the medics were starting a neb treatment. Imagine my surprise when I open the doors and there is no cot
I walk back in and try to be discreet and let the lead medic know that they didn't bring a cot. She had a new employee with her that night and they were running ragged all shift. The new guy who was in charge of getting the rig ready after the previous call left it at the hospital that was a 30 minute drive away.
Talk about embarrassing

 

[Stephanie.]

It has never happened to me- but I know of many crews that leave bags and equipment at the patients house.

 

[JPINFV]

A few that I'm kinda of surprised that I either didn't see mentioned or missed.

First critical patient outside of field training (acute pulmonary edema) and I absolutely had to finish my assessment before loading and expediting transport. Yea, tunnel vision.

Underestimate the turning radius of a type 3 ambulance (van front, box back).

Didn't realize the entire flap thing that had to be put down on c-collars to make them rigid and form the proper shape.

Using the argument "protocol" to justify placing a patient on a NRB (The only time I've ever been truly ashamed about my treatment).

Got lost because I was 100% sure I knew where this facility off the beaten path was that I'd only been to a few times was.

 

[EMT-IT753]

I also found out that when loading a patient in the back of the ambulance and you are using a power cot, keep your finger off the button once the legs are all the way up. I couldn't figure out why the patient was tilting sideways