What is your most ridiculous call?

[milhouse]

I would have to say that this was my most "ridiculous" call;

toned out for unknown medical around 1am. mark in route Code 3 since "unknown" dispatch radio's, that caller requests not to run "lights and sirens" because kids are sleeping and doesnt want them woken up. so we down grade per callers request and medic's permission. We AOS to find male PT standing on front porch smoking a cigarette. PT walks up to us as we step out of ambulance. PT states i have a head-ache and want to go to hospital #2 (hospital #1 is our hospital) when we ask the pt why he wants to go to the hosp. #2 and not #1 he states that hospital #1 didnt do a good job for him last time and that he wants to go to the other. keep in mind in order to get to hospital #2 we have to go past ours!!!!! and what does my medic do ( i could have killed him for this ) he tells the PT fine you want to go to other hospital sign bypass here and get in the back.

PT had no real medical reason to go to other hospital. needless to say i didnt get back to sleep till almost 3 that morning, and thinking back i should have never down graded per callers request lol....

 

[Fir Na Au Saol]

Got called out once for a sunburn. Told my partenr; "This dude's name better be Icarus!"

 

[ertech]

I was doing an ambulance clinical and we was dispatched to a house for a complaint of leg paralysis,upon arrival we found it was a kid who fell asleep sitting on a toilet,his legs fell asleep and his mom called 911

 

[Doug]

Most ridiculas because of buracracy...
Called to a school for maintenence man who cut his finger (it was going to need stitches) but bleeding controlled etc.
Pt says "I wanted to drive myself or have Jack (other janitor) drive me. But they won't let me."
Turns out the school admin has a policy that anything that might be workmans comp claim needs to go by ambulance or they won't pay.

 

[Doug]

I worked for a comapny that covered 911 and non-emegert transports.
We have to get a form filled out decribeing WHY this pt NEEDS an ambulance. I asked the nurse to fill it out and she said "What am I supposed to write?" I said that I didn't know I don't know the pt. So she gts pissed and thinks she is being smart and says "Well, I'll just write that the pt is at risk for Sudden Cardiac Arrest." To which I said "Um...we all are...that's the definition of sudden Cardiac arrest." She argued back that that's what she's putting and she's not going to change it. So I countered "Do you REALLY want it on your record that you discharged a pt that you thought was at possible immediate risk for cardiac arrest? Cause if you put that on the paper I'm going to stop at the ER on the way out and tell them that I need to have a pt evaluated for risk of SCA." She turned white and admitted that the pt needed a wheelchair van but there wasn't one available for 30 minutes and they wanted him out NOW. Thank you, there will be chair transport here in 30 minutes, bye.

 

[Sasha]

Haha. I always had them sign the CMN, and if they didn't fill it out and it wasn't obvious as to why they needed ambulance transport, I just turned it in without the boxes checked and let billing deal with it. ^_^

 

[medic417]

Haha. I always had them sign the CMN, and if they didn't fill it out and it wasn't obvious as to why they needed ambulance transport, I just turned it in without the boxes checked and let billing deal with it. ^_^

If the forms not filled out we do not roll on the few transfers we handle. Policy requires a properly filled out form, failure to get a properly filled out form is grounds for termination. If they refuse to provide it we leave.

 

[jochi1543]

C/C from dispatch: "queer sensation in head."


......................

 

[Sasha]

If the forms not filled out we do not roll on the few transfers we handle. Policy requires a properly filled out form, failure to get a properly filled out form is grounds for termination. If they refuse to provide it we leave.

Well I never got in trouble for it, so hakuna matata.

 

[JPINFV]

C/C from dispatch: "queer sensation in head."


......................

Sounds like a reasonable use of the original meaning of queer. After all, who hasn't felt a little queer from time to time?

 

[jochi1543]

Sounds like a reasonable use of the original meaning of queer. After all, who hasn't felt a little queer from time to time?

Here's another one, "choked on juice, conscious and breathing...."















She had Down syndrome, though, so the PCA was just being cautious. But dispatch didn't give us any of that info, so we were like, seriously, choked on juice, conscious and breathing?

 

[Ryanpfd]

I've got two of them.
2am in the morning. A drunk 18 year old getting arrested for a DWI, on the top of her lungs screaming "I can't breathe"
my reply "ma'am its 2am in the morning and your O2 level is fine(at 98%), If you insist you cannot breathe atleast weaze or something to make it believable."

the second one
I was sent to a call at what looked to be a hobit hole. a man walks out side to meet us by his mail box and sais "Im having a stroke!" my reply "OK! lets get in. Im confused why he is talking and walking ok. turns out his foot was asleep

 

[Sasha]

I've got two of them.
2am in the morning. A drunk 18 year old getting arrested for a DWI, on the top of her lungs screaming "I can't breathe"
my reply "ma'am its 2am in the morning and your O2 level is fine(at 98%), If you insist you cannot breathe atleast weaze or something to make it believable."

SpO2 only accounts for hemoglobin saturation. You can have a sat of 100%% but that doesn't mean the tissue is getting perfused. Poor perfusion can definitely account for the "I can't breathe!"

Don't get so hung up on numbers. Treat the patient, not the pulse ox.

 

[Katie Elaine]

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.

 

[Buzz]

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.

 

[Ryanpfd]

SpO2 only accounts for hemoglobin saturation. You can have a sat of 100%% but that doesn't mean the tissue is getting perfused. Poor perfusion can definitely account for the "I can't breathe!"

Don't get so hung up on numbers. Treat the patient, not the pulse ox.

I treated the PT fine. Im not going into full detail of the call. We've all seen the person getting arrested thinking if they fake sick they will get out. That was the point.

 

[amberdt03]

call from the dallas va hospital to return a patient room s/p fall. i look at the patient and i'm thinking something isn't right. his right leg is shorter than his left, and it is rotated laterally, so i'm thinking hip fracture. i ask the nurse if anything was wrong with him and they said everything came back negative. so we move this poor vet over to our cot and he starts screaming bloody murder, and i said "sir, i think your hip is broken, but what do i know, i'm just an emt" right in front of his nurse, who starts looking at me like i don't know what i'm talking about. we are driving to his house and i'm driving slow as heck to not hit any bumps. we turn on his street and i get told by dispatch to public service, so i think ah heck they complained on me. i public service and they said we had to go back cause they had just confirmed a hip fracture. i never said the f-word so many times, i must have set a record. my partner apologized to him and said that his hip was broken and we needed to take him back. i felt so bad for him and when we got back i apologized to him and said at least this time he would have a nurse that actually wanted to take care of him and not one that just wanted to go home.



anybody had any similar incidents with any v.a. hospitals?

 

[Shishkabob]

amber, I was doing one up in Denton (you'll recognize the place but I can't say... it's just very.. "vintage" ^_^ )

So we get a priority 2 out there for a pt with 2 unwitnessed falls. PT has hx of fx from falls. They had her sitting in the wheelchair...complaining of neck, back, and hip pain.

Yea... ok...

 

[amberdt03]

amber, I was doing one up in Denton (you'll recognize the place but I can't say... it's just very.. "vintage" ^_^ )

So we get a priority 2 out there for a pt with 2 unwitnessed falls. PT has hx of fx from falls. They had her sitting in the wheelchair...complaining of neck, back, and hip pain.

Yea... ok...

ha. yeah that place is awesome. glad i don't have to deal with that stuff hardly anymore. probably will when i'm done with this semester though.:sad: gotta make that money.

 

[InsidiousStealth]

Here's a good one I had on my practicum

So we get a call for a "omega" response....yes I said Omega lol

I won't give too much clues as to what dispatch said cause it will ruin the story

So we get there theres 5 cops surrounding one guy with crutches. They wouldnt let him go inside his house to use the bathroom and were about to arrest him. He wasn't aloud inside his house cause he had been physically abusive to his wife. They aloud him to have one phone call before they took him away and he decided to call 911 cause they wouldnt let him go to the bathroom....lol