When I was a student doing my ride-time, I rode with a small city ambulance, so I saw a lot or ridiculous calls. But one that sticks out in my mind was a call to a man who had fallen and cut his hand-- in the upper hospital parking lot. So, we had to respond from across town, to let the man walk to the ambulance, sit on the stretcher, put some gauze on the cut, then drive him across the parking lot to the ER.
We had a hint to believe he had a slight altered mental status, but he was with a nurse not 100 yards from the ER doors. We were all pretty confused on that one.
Perhaps he wanted immediate treatment? I once got a call for a woman experiencing moderate abdominal pain (but claimed she could walk just fine while she was complaining that we were going to take her in on the stretcher). She called from a pay phone across the street from the ER doors. The way the hospital layout was, there was only a 50yd distance to travel--if you weren't walking in a straight line.
Ridiculous call from not too long ago:
Dispatched to an address across the street from a bar for a male in respiratory distress. We began speculating as to what we were going to run into seeing as dispatch specifically mentioned it was across the street from a fairly popular bar. As we turn onto the street, we see PD lights up the road and figure our suspicions of someone getting pulled over coming out of the bar not wanting to go to jail were correct. We pull up behind the two cruisers, and notice a man standing on the side of the road but no other vehicle. Closer inspection revealed that the address we were given was just a large, heavily wooded lot. We then noticed there were no police to be seen. I got out of the truck and the guy walks over and says "I know this guy, he's not kidding around. Something's wrong.. I don't know if he OD'd or what but he needs help." I asked where he was, and he points off into the woods. Great. I tell my partner (who by now was wearing his fluorescent yellow roadside vest) to grab the pole stretcher because the guy was in the woods. By this time, fire was pulling up behind us (which is odd considering we beat them to the scene with their station literally less than 1 minute down the road--we saw them pulling their rig out of the station as we drove by and they waited to pull out until we'd made it to the scene). I explained what was going on, and we got our stuff and started following the guy through the woods. Well, it's dark and one of the fire guys decides to get the pickup and try to shine the headlights into the woods to give us some more light. So my partner, without letting me know, stops and waits for the fire guys and I keep walking into the darkness alone with the creepy guy. The only light I have at this point is my little flashlight. Through the trees I started noticing fire light and the LEOs standing there. Beer bottles everywhere, piles of human fecal matter, and makeshift shelters were all around us. The pt was sitting, huddled up, rocking back and forth. His clothes appeared wet, he smelled of urine, and his face was blackened. The guy said nothing to us. We put him on the pole stretcher and began the approximately 600 yard walk out of the woods. Periodically, the man would sit up and cough up blackened mucus. We get him into the truck, and he somewhat talks to us. Told us he'd had 10-12 beers and thinks he had a seizure, which he had a history of. He also mentioned that his face, hands, and head hurt. Well, as soon as we got him into the truck with the lights on high, we noticed superficial burns to his face and hands. Said he thinks he might have fallen into the fire--explains that difficulty breathing. We also cut off his wet clothing and tried getting some warm blankets on him as he was fading in and out of the conversation. We attempted to get a B/P and he freaked out on us but said he still wanted to go to the hospital. He was only AOx1-2 at the most, and was beginning to get combative, so we just decided to get going. I ended up calling the hospital with a list of complaints: post-seizure, DIB with facial burns, possible OD, and ETOH intoxication, and pt combative. Throughout the transport, the guy would jump up--or as much as the seatbelts would let him, yell at me, then fall backwards on the stretcher unresponsive again. Got to the hospital and gave my report, which the staff found amusing. When I went back into the room to get a signature from the nurse the patient looks at me and my partner and then at the nurse and says "Those guys are really starting to piss me off." I got a kick out of that.
