Back To Work

Saturday I wake up and I'm ready for it, ready to put back on my Paramedic Rocker and go back to work, I decide that I'll get in and just tell my Preceptor how I feel, that tonight I just need to have fun, a stress free night of just doing the job together, no grilling questions about protocols or anything just fun. I walk into work earlier then normal for my shift, my supervisor is delighted to see me back, gives me a pat on the back and again tells me he thinks I'm going to be a great Paramedic and again offers his support, and tells me he's glad to see me back. My preceptor walks in and asks how I'm doing, and I tell him the truth, I tell him not the greatest, I tell him how nervous I am and he agrees, tonight will be a fun night. I get in the back of the truck and start to check out my gear, it gets my nerves going, I never get through checking the gear with out getting thrown into a call, tonight is different, tonight my preceptor gets in the back of the truck and helps me go through the gear, I settle down, I get comfortable again, I'm going to make it through this. I go to grab more equipment for our truck, and I noticed my preceptor is rather eager and hurried to have me put it away in the truck, I open the side door and see a pie sitting on my ALS bag, I break out into laughter, victim of a good prank. See during CISD we were asked how we had all decided to deal with our stress, I commented that "I throw Pie" and went on to explain after an altercation with my g/f that I had tossed a pie out my front door and down the sidewalk in frustration, to only wake up the next morning and find it back on my front porch with a note that said "I think you dropped this" apparently my neighbor witnessed this incident and found the entire event funny, as did my coworkers when hearing about the story, thus tonight everyone will eat pie at my expense. We head out onto the road, its a slow night we run a few calls 1 ALS, 2 BLS drunks that were rather humorous in nature, my preceptor and his partner run the calls, I just help them out and get comfortable being back in the truck doing 911 calls. At 2am that morning we were given an ALS transfer, now these are particularly harder to come by at night, and needing at least 1 for my precepting period it came time for me to step up and take this one.

He's 22 years old, just trying to have a good time when he made a bad choice, this gentlemen decided to jump on a couch that was on fire, sounded like a fun cool guy thing to do. Unfortunately it earned him a trip to Bridgeport Burn Center w/ 2nd and 3rd Degree burns to 25% of his body. Its a routine trip, I calculate a drip rate based on the Parkland Formula for Burns quickly in my head based on the Pts weight and his total percent of burns, and it matches the MD's orders, I also receive verbal orders for Pain Control for my Patient during transport, basically this kid has been given 23mg of Morphine thus far, 100mg of Fentanyl, and I now have additional orders for only 4mg every 30 minutes as needed, my standing orders by Protocol are better then that order, but I'm not the doc here so I abide and write down her orders. We get our Patient as comfortable as we can manage, this kid has burns to his arms and his back, its going to be a long trip for him. We set off for Bridgeport and immediately have to give him an initial dose of Morphine, we get him as comfortable as we can, and we talked the whole ride down, we keep his pain at a minimum with the first dose and get him to Bridgeport. We bring him upstairs and transfer him to their staff, we clean up our stretcher, and as we get ready to leave something catches my eye. A guy is sitting up in one of the rooms, 60% of his body is covered with sterile dressing including his face, he's looking out at us as we pass by, I look into his eyes and see the pain and agony in his eyes, I get the goose bumps as I walk by, I think to myself that what I am going through in my life is petty compared the pain and tragedy felt by others.