LACoGurneyjockey
Forum Asst. Chief
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Our county just put out the draft for a new Spinal Motion Restriction protocol to take effect in June, in the past having collared and boarded any and everyone with any physical findings or ALOC in a setting of trauma. Grandma rolled out of bed and has some hip/femur pain? Well that's a distracting injury in a setting of trauma, let's put grandma on a backboard for the transport down a dirt road and up to 60min drive to the hospital. Billy bob has been drinking and got punched by Joe bob? Etoh and head trauma definitely needs a backboard.
When the new protocol takes effect we will place them on the gurney, supine/position of comfort, with a c-collar. If they can walk, assist them to the gurney, or otherwise use a breakaway flat. The only indication for a board will be extrication, to be removed once they're on the gurney. I'll be finishing up medic school and starting my internship right around the time this new protocol takes effect, and now every time I hear my instructor telling us "we need to c-spine this and backboard that" I cringe a little inside.
The reason I'm posting this isn't just to gloat that we are finally catching up to the rest of EMS, ever so slightly and a little late to the party. But I wanted to get input from others who have made the switch on how difficult it was to break the habit of backboarding everyone for anything.
How hard was it for the medics who had spent all their time in EMS backboarding every significant trauma to stop, and just put a patient on the gurney with a collar? Backboards have always been perceived as one of the more important interventions in any trauma patient. And now to see them effectively vanish, I just wonder how our experienced medics will make the switch.
When the new protocol takes effect we will place them on the gurney, supine/position of comfort, with a c-collar. If they can walk, assist them to the gurney, or otherwise use a breakaway flat. The only indication for a board will be extrication, to be removed once they're on the gurney. I'll be finishing up medic school and starting my internship right around the time this new protocol takes effect, and now every time I hear my instructor telling us "we need to c-spine this and backboard that" I cringe a little inside.
The reason I'm posting this isn't just to gloat that we are finally catching up to the rest of EMS, ever so slightly and a little late to the party. But I wanted to get input from others who have made the switch on how difficult it was to break the habit of backboarding everyone for anything.
How hard was it for the medics who had spent all their time in EMS backboarding every significant trauma to stop, and just put a patient on the gurney with a collar? Backboards have always been perceived as one of the more important interventions in any trauma patient. And now to see them effectively vanish, I just wonder how our experienced medics will make the switch.
