I'm currently an EMT-B student. I take my exam Jan 19 and my practicals Jan 21. There's an Intermediate course that begins on Jan 31. Is this too soon to make the jump from B to I. Would I (and my patients) be better off if I got a little more practical experience under my belt?
Too soon ???
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The jump from EMT-B to Paramedic has been discussed here several times before, but I don' t think we've ever talked about the EMT-B to EMT-I jump.
My personal opinion is to wait a while and get some street experience under your belt. You'll gain confidence in your skills levels (and your patients can sense this) before you come after them with an 18ga needle. Also, you're better able to put the case studies into perspective during the EMT-I class.
My personal opinion is to wait a while and get some street experience under your belt. You'll gain confidence in your skills levels (and your patients can sense this) before you come after them with an 18ga needle. Also, you're better able to put the case studies into perspective during the EMT-I class.
Ridryder911
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it's nice to have experience, but sincethis is Intermediate level I say go for it. There is not much diffference, and by the timeyou get through class you will have experience.
Good luck,
R/R 911
Good luck,
R/R 911
ExpatMedic0
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I think you should go for it ASAP if you can get in the class.
I started as a First Responder on a EMS explorer post, then I went to EMT-B then I went to EMT - Intermediate and I am a Paramedic student. I can tell you this, if you plan on going on or even if your not sure and thinking of going to Paramedic later and you feel you need more experience, education, and that extra edge then I Recommend intermediate.
It will help you get accepted over EMT-B's in some paramedic programs
You will learn your basic cardiac drugs and rhythms, and start to calculate basic drug calculations such as Lido. you'll get plenty of I.V. experience, and in the mean time no Transporting 911 agency who runs 1 emt and 1 medic on a rig or who runs ILS rigs wants to hire a EMT-B that can do nothing, when they can hire a EMT-I pay him or her almost the same rate and get everything out of them.
If you do not plan on getting your paramedic and you want to do EMT as a part time or volunteer thing for your EMS career I also highly recommend Intermediate.
Now here are some reasons I don't recommend Intermediate
If you live in a Major metropolitan city with about 1 million or so people in or around it there's no need for Intermediates, you may not even be able to use any of your intermediate skills, some states or county's revert you back to a basic, and worse of all, if you ever plan on moving no other state will accept your intermediate rating unless you get Nationally Registry Intermediate, and even then only a handful of states that I know of widely accept it. Intermediate is extremely fast pace for what your excepted to learn, know and perform, you can now push narcotics, use advance airways, and making a c couple clinical decision making skills regarding drugs that if you screw up, could end someone's life....
So as an Intermediate myself that's what I have to say take it for what's it worth, and also please keep in mind I live in Portland Oregon, the info I gave you could be completely irrelevant to your state and or city.
ALso if you plan on doing EMS as a fulltime career to support yourself and live of off alone (haha as if you could j/k) You must get your paramedic, atleast if your on in Oregon or Wahsington.....
if you plan on doing fire as a career then Intermediate might serve you well if you have other things to bring to the table and dont want all the extra education in EMS.
I started as a First Responder on a EMS explorer post, then I went to EMT-B then I went to EMT - Intermediate and I am a Paramedic student. I can tell you this, if you plan on going on or even if your not sure and thinking of going to Paramedic later and you feel you need more experience, education, and that extra edge then I Recommend intermediate.
It will help you get accepted over EMT-B's in some paramedic programs
You will learn your basic cardiac drugs and rhythms, and start to calculate basic drug calculations such as Lido. you'll get plenty of I.V. experience, and in the mean time no Transporting 911 agency who runs 1 emt and 1 medic on a rig or who runs ILS rigs wants to hire a EMT-B that can do nothing, when they can hire a EMT-I pay him or her almost the same rate and get everything out of them.
If you do not plan on getting your paramedic and you want to do EMT as a part time or volunteer thing for your EMS career I also highly recommend Intermediate.
Now here are some reasons I don't recommend Intermediate
If you live in a Major metropolitan city with about 1 million or so people in or around it there's no need for Intermediates, you may not even be able to use any of your intermediate skills, some states or county's revert you back to a basic, and worse of all, if you ever plan on moving no other state will accept your intermediate rating unless you get Nationally Registry Intermediate, and even then only a handful of states that I know of widely accept it. Intermediate is extremely fast pace for what your excepted to learn, know and perform, you can now push narcotics, use advance airways, and making a c couple clinical decision making skills regarding drugs that if you screw up, could end someone's life....
So as an Intermediate myself that's what I have to say take it for what's it worth, and also please keep in mind I live in Portland Oregon, the info I gave you could be completely irrelevant to your state and or city.
ALso if you plan on doing EMS as a fulltime career to support yourself and live of off alone (haha as if you could j/k) You must get your paramedic, atleast if your on in Oregon or Wahsington.....
if you plan on doing fire as a career then Intermediate might serve you well if you have other things to bring to the table and dont want all the extra education in EMS.
Here, you can't go on until you have ten patient contacts (Not saying that's a huge number, but it took me a year to get that here in the boonies.) Is there no requirement at all where you live, or is there a requirement you've met? And are you with a service now? I'm just not sure I'd waste time in classes until I was pretty sure I knew I wouldn't mind doing it for real, but you may already know that anyhow. I don't remember what your background is.
squid said:
I've volunteered with the busiest station in the county. It's not uncommon for them to be three rescue calls deep on the weekends. I've done a few rides as an observer while waiting on my paperwork to go through, but I'm not going to use that towards my 20 required hours. I'm not sure if there's a requirement in VA on the number of Pt contacts required after BLS certification before advancing but certainly something I'll need to find out. Shouldn't be a problem though, given our call volume.
Ridryder911 said:
This was my thinking as well.
I guess I just lucked out that an Intermediate course is available so soon after my BLS class is over. It's just that in talking with some of the other vollies, I kinda got the impression (though no one said as much) that they felt like I was cheating somehow. Like I'm breaking some unwritten rule about how long you have to be a B before becoming an I.
Makes sense to me. I think that one of the biggest reasons not to advance is not just lack of experience as in skills practice, but in attitude. You don't want to wind up with all kinds of fancy certs and not liking to do EMS. But if you're actually been on a few calls, even if you haven't done much, you sort of have a handle on whether it makes sense for you to go on.
emtd29
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I'm going to agree with ffemt8798.
Get some experience under your belt first. IMHO, you should wait like a year before going for your intermediate, The more experience you have, the better you'll do
Get some experience under your belt first. IMHO, you should wait like a year before going for your intermediate, The more experience you have, the better you'll do
coloradoemt
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SWVAEMT said:
Absolutely!!!
Be sure to check with your state EMS office before you take the class. Here in SC you MUST be a basic for 6 months prior to taking your I, the only exception is if you are enrolled in the 2 yr AHS degree program at Greenville Tech. Plus the experience would be very helpful...and the I programs vary from state to state, example SC only uses the I/85 standards, all you learn new from basic is IV and acid/base balance.