Paramedic

Today was the second day for my EV. Ridzwan took the first call for his evaluation and there I was sitting in the station kaypoing in front of the cubicon system (a system that records all our ambulance calls). Scrolling, scrolling thru and saw a lot of cases, mostly fall and injured, complaint of very sick etc. My station ambulance got a collapsed case... haizzz.. life of a paramedic...

Saw the incident text for a mass casualties case (the tampines playground on fire case) and the one of the Red Rhino and taxi..... its a sad case.. tsk tsk..

Come to think of it, life as a paramedic is really a challenging job. Timely and correct treatment, decisive in decision making, command & control of the situation, patient management,all these with a 3-man crew. Not forgetting to throw in PR skills (we are dealing with public here) in providing good customer service. If not, will tio complaint letter, which is the better of the other evil of direct write-in to newspaper... -_-"

It re-enforced in me the pressure of being a EAS on the road. Always expect the unexpected while on the road, do not believe in what the call text state.. the caller might say its a case of fainted, but its a collapse case when you reached the scene. Also, you must master the art of "keeping" your "treasure" if you are in toilet halfway when the alarm sound for an ambulance call.... haha. Many a times your packet of lunch will take you 2-3 hours before you can finished the food, that is if you are unlucky and got proceed to another call.

Frankly, we do understand the fustration and anxiety of the public when sometime happens, but there are situations which are beyond our control, eg. traffic congestion or no nearest ambulance is available. Much as we wanted to get to the patient as fast as we can, somtimes, situations dun allow us. Please do not think we take our own sweet time to attend to our patients, we know more than anybody how crucial time is to our patient. Which is why public education is VERY VERY important on using of the EAS. By abusing the EAS, people are depriving of real emergency cases that genuinely require more of the service...... and not forgetting to give way to ambulance that has the siren and becon lights blasting away. We dun turn them on for laughter, peace and joy.....

After all these bubblish... I am still looking forward to being a crew leader of an ambulance. The REAL challenge has just begun.....