What is it about EMS personell that nurses/docs dont like?

[04_edge]

I had the worst experience of my life tonight with nurses. I was doing a rotation in the labor a delivery department at a hospital...

It started when i was sent to an area that literally had 1 patient, when there are 7-ish areas with a whole lot more in each. I ended up sitting there studying for a while when i overheard a nurse talking to a midwife saying that such and such is starting to get "pushy" but the way she said it sounded like it was still going to be a little bit. The nurse ended up asking me to sit there and answer the phone if anyone called. Not 5 minutes later they erased the PT's name on the board and wrote "baby." I then asked them about it and sure enough the pt had delivered and no one decided to tell me about it.

I ended up bagging my stuff up and leaving to another area without saying anything.

There we (me and a classmate) were told that there are going to be midwife students there so we wont be able to assist because it will "put to much pressure on them(the Midwife student)". Ended up talking to a family and asked if it was ok if we could observe their delivery, they said yes. When the time came we went into the room, only to have the midwife ask us if we can leave until she delivers.

I don't get it? It was blatantly obvious today that none of the nurses wanted us there. Ive never had that happen before, i mean theres been a couple here and there, but this was basically an entire area of the hospital.

Any ideas?

 

[46Young]

EMS are at the bottom of the totem pole in the hospital. If you have medical students or residents, they're going to take care of their own. Same for nursing students. Our relative lack of education and maturity only work against us as well. Good luck getting tubes in the O.R.

 

[usafmedic45]

-Lack of education/knowledge
-Undeserved sense of entitlement/superiority
-Lack of respect
-Lack of awareness of place/importance in the world

 

[rwik123]

I had the worst experience of my life tonight with nurses. I was doing a rotation in the labor a delivery department at a hospital...

It started when i was sent to an area that literally had 1 patient, when there are 7-ish areas with a whole lot more in each. I ended up sitting there studying for a while when i overheard a nurse talking to a midwife saying that such and such is starting to get "pushy" but the way she said it sounded like it was still going to be a little bit. The nurse ended up asking me to sit there and answer the phone if anyone called. Not 5 minutes later they erased the PT's name on the board and wrote "baby." I then asked them about it and sure enough the pt had delivered and no one decided to tell me about it.

I ended up bagging my stuff up and leaving to another area without saying anything.

There we (me and a classmate) were told that there are going to be midwife students there so we wont be able to assist because it will "put to much pressure on them(the Midwife student)". Ended up talking to a family and asked if it was ok if we could observe their delivery, they said yes. When the time came we went into the room, only to have the midwife ask us if we can leave until she delivers.

I don't get it? It was blatantly obvious today that none of the nurses wanted us there. Ive never had that happen before, i mean theres been a couple here and there, but this was basically an entire area of the hospital.

Any ideas?

I agree with what the above post said. I've had good relations and bad ones also. It seems as though there's an overall lack of education and understanding on what each other does. Without one another, :censored::censored::censored::censored: would hit the fan fast and hard. The other day I had a nurse ask me if I knew how to use an ambu bag.
Figures

As far as your story, it's blatantly obvious they didn't take any extra effort to engage you. Don't take it personally, hopefully you'll meet that one MD or RN that acts right and takes you under their wing.

 

[foxfire]

I have not done a labor and delivery rotation yet, but I have come across some nurses that were very anti-medic in other departments.
The one thing that helped in gaining her approval was jumping in and doing the cleaning, knowing your stuff inside and out, being willing to learn the nurses way of doing things, oh and did I mention really knowing your stuff.
And if that does not work talk to your field shift condinator and see what they would say to do. Some places are just hard to have a opportunity to learn at.
Do you Have more than one hospital for clinical rotations? Try a different shift, or different hospital.

 

[MrBrown]

-Lack of education/knowledge
-Undeserved sense of entitlement/superiority
-Lack of respect
-Lack of awareness of place/importance in the world

+ 1 gadzillion

 

[Flight-LP]

-Lack of education/knowledge
-Undeserved sense of entitlement/superiority
-Lack of respect
-Lack of awareness of place/importance in the world

Well spoken, that pretty much sums it up!

 

[firecoins]

I recall my own rotation in L&D. I had to compete with residents, med students and nursing students. I had no problem with this. I got to see my deliveries and a C-section. Nurses were great and had no problem with me. Some RNs are anti medic. You just need to use your people skills. If you don't have people skills, oh well.

 

[Melclin]

Never come across that here. We ran into one or two problems on our OB placements, but mostly because of organizational issues. The midwives and nurses were more than helpful. I remember one going out of her way to organize with theatre staff to allow me to observe a c-section. In turn, the theatre staff again went out of their way to make sure I could see and to answer my questions. Then an anaesthetists, hearing I was a student, explained his pts and his thoughts and quizzed me on shock and kidney function and pharmacology. Hell of a day. Most other people had similarly enjoyable experiences.

Of course I've been yelled at by a grumpy nurse here and there, but its nothing to do with being a medic student. Its because I was in their way, or I was doing something wrong.

We all go to uni together. Nurses, paramedics, midwives, OTs, physios. We share a lot of first year classes. That probably helps.

I imagine the problem you guys face is similar to St Johns volly event First Responders here. They know nothing, but often think they know everything and often have a drastically inflated sense of self importance. Given prehospital education in the states, you probably get a lot of the same type of poorly educated ricki-rescue wankas and consequently are not looked upon well by HCPs.

 

[mp5dude]

Keep in mind I live in a some what rural area - approx. 60,000 people in the county split among two Level III trauma centers. (At any normal time there is approx 3-4 Patients in the ER and roughly 5-6 nurses 1-3 docs 2-3 ER techs.

They don't take the time to listen to the radio report or the report given in the room with the patient. They end up asking questions like they had their ears plugged for both reports.

They don't understand that What we perceive as a situation where we may or may not be able to provide a specific treatment due to the nature of the call. We do not want to aggravate things on scene or in the back of the rig. They want EVERY little thing to follow a set protocol. Sometimes you have to deviate from that plan to fit the specific situation. Creativity is a big part of being an EMT. There may be some situations that you are only able to imagine. (ex. Patient OD'd on some anti-depressants. Patient had violent tendency's in the past. Really think we are going to fight with them to do a 12L???? Establish an IV??? They are already worked up due to the situation... the last thing we need is for them to come swinging at us...)

unfortunately for me - I've found out that (where I live) most of the doctors dont know what is going on. We had a couple of them complain about not following proper protocols (which we were - they were following a different county's)

They also do not trust us to make "good sound" patient care choices. Apparently going in to the room saying hi to the patient and then walking over to a computer to look at cars is a great way to have good sound patient care.
(ex. my department only carries EPI-Pens (Jr/Adult) - don't ask why, I have no clue. - arrive on scene of a female that had an allergic reaction to an unknown source - most likely some sort of nut. Patient's condition did not deteriorate to the point where we would need to put Epi into the patients system. We arrive at the ER and the Doc complains to us (in front of the patient) that we should have gave the patient Epi. We did not due to the fact that the patient had stable vital signs as well as no difficulty breathing after the oxygen had been placed on the patient for a while.)

It takes them 20+ minutes to get pain management and assistance to a male patient that got his hand stuck in a machine at a steel factory (mind you several of his fingers are only attached by skin)

There's my rant about nothing. There is always some good and some bad. I could tell you many times I've had a good experience and I could also tell you A LOT more bad ones.

 

[Sandog]

Have you not heard, nurses eat their young ? :huh:

 

[Handsome Robb]

I had really good experiences in my clinicals and rides. In the ER at the trauma center the tech they assigned me to was an ***. I just started talking to other techs and nurses and ended up shadowing them and getting to perform quite a few skills and learn a lot.

I have heard other horror stories as well though.

 

[slb862]

I would like to recommend, going back to class and find out who YOUR Medical Control is for your class. Invite them in and find out what you all can do to help build a better relationship, while in clinicals and when working in the field. I have found having a positive outlook, take constructive criticism, know you are human, and smile, are all positives. And whatever you do keep your head up. (don't be staring at the ground)

Remember that maybe "they" are having a lousy day, or a busy shift.

I have been lucky to have worked with some fabulous Medical Control Doctors. Their patience, understanding, and knowledge taught me so much.

When I was the "new old kid" I brought my experience, knowledge, confidence, and I earned respect. It comes, and you too will look back and say "Wow, look where I have been and how far I have come".

Plus, one more thing... Remember when you have been doing this for a long period of time, and that green, new student or employee starts on your shift, "Remember Where You Started"

Hope this helps, or as I say "learn what you want from me, take it, use it, or use what works for you" We are all in this together.

PEACE, and stay safe.

 

[TransportJockey]

I've kinda been on both sides of this. I've been a hospital tech and seen medic and RN students on my floor, and I've been a medic student doing clinicals. From the floor standpoint, I'd rather have the RN students. They know their place in the hospital hierarchy, they don't complain when you ask them to help clean (as a tech, they did a lot of my work for me ), they realize that other allied health and healthcare proffessions might need to take priority over them.
Medic students I worked with on the floor were a lot of th time, rude and didn't seem to want to do anything that they couldn't correlate directly with what they could do in the field. It's like they forgot medicine is medicine, no matter where you are working.
I honestly had no problems during my clinical shifts, and I think part of that was because of my time working as a hospital tech, because I wasn't afraid to get my hands dirty and do any little odd job I could to make sure I got to see the best stuff

 

[lampnyter]

I hated my EMT clinical hours. The head nurse literally wouldnt let me talk to any of the patients.

 

[04_edge]

I see where yall are coming from. I guess i was just suprised because my last L&D rotation went great. Within 5 minutes of being there the midwife grabbed me and had me deliver. There were med students that day to, and one of them gave me what was supposed to be their deliery. He even walked me through how to gown up with staying sterile and all that good stuff.

I'm also not saying i havent had great nurses or docs to work with before. There are several ive met that are awesome to be around and ive learned alot from them. I guess i just got with a bad bunch yesterday.

 

[8jimi8]

Clinical experience is what you make of it. If I see you siting there dong homework, instead of taking an interest in what is going on, i'm going to offer you the phone to answer. As a nursing student I never had an issue with clinical experiences. As a an RN doing EMS rotations, I've been offered jobs.

If you sit there and mutter curses into your books, what do you expect? Get involved, ask questions, look interested.

 

[04_edge]

Clinical experience is what you make of it. If I see you siting there dong homework, instead of taking an interest in what is going on, i'm going to offer you the phone to answer. As a nursing student I never had an issue with clinical experiences. As a an RN doing EMS rotations, I've been offered jobs.

If you sit there and mutter curses into your books, what do you expect? Get involved, ask questions, look interested.

Except for the fact that on arrival i was told that there are med students there till 5 so i probably wont get to do anything till after then. Then when 7 oclock rolled around the midwife students showed up and we were told that we wont be able to assist because it will put too much pressure on them. Even when we went into a room after already asking the family if we could observe their delivery, we were told to leave by a midwife.

As far as the studying, thats what we are told to do by our instructors when in L&D. They check vitals once every 2 hours if i remember correctly, and when there is only one patient in the area you're in, and the 2 nurses working there have their heads buried in the computer surfing the internet, what else am i to do?

 

[Jon]

I've had good and bad L&D experiences. As a young male, it seems the staff on the unit reacts negatively to the mere presence of a Y-chromosome in their midst.

I understand that it's appropriate to seek the patient's permission before having random folks present for a delivery. I'm Ok with this, but I had one nurse ask a patient "there's a paramedic student who wants to observe the delivery. You don't have to let him - you're allowed to say no". Yup. Said no. As opposed to "this is Jon, he's a paramedic student, and observing on our unit today in case he ever has to deliver a baby in the field". That worked SO much better.

 

[FireResuce48]

There was usually at least one person at my clinicals who loved to teach students.
I really enjoyed my OR time getting intubations the most. The anesthesiologist I followed not only made sure I got as many intubations and airways as I could but also explained her job and why she did certain things. I picked up a lot more knowledge with her then I would have ever thought I would.