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Paramedics from Hell 3


From : Phil Arnold 18 May 95
Subj : Paramedics from Hell 3
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I worked the 11pm - 7 am shift in the lovely city of Everett, MA. Or
as some of us call it - 'Ever rot.' A city close to Boston, where
the IROC is king, and an errant cigarette touching the 'spritzed
big-hair' of a woman could cause flashbacks to the days when Michael
Jackson ran around doing his impression of 'the human torch.' I tell
you: if it don't touch the ceiling, it ain't big enough.

An aside: I'm beginning to think there's a 'hairarchy' involved when
several women get together. Obviously, the one with the biggest 'do'
is the alpha female. The postion is tenuous, as the alpha female can
fall to the many natural disasters in the wild: high humidity (bad for
'do'), hair too high (raising center of gravity - instability), and
the ever-present danger - errant cigarette waving. The ability to chew
many sticks of gum and smoke 'menthol' cigarettes at the same time is
also a good indicator of alpha female material. But I digress ...

The shift started off well: I sat at a Dunky's for about an hour with
my partner, Pam (we call her medic '007' - license to kill), and we
counted the number of cops that came in and got 'Boston creme' donuts
with their coffee - many. I tell you, the best way to 'case' a city -
to see if their police department is 'on the ball' is to hang out at
a donut shop to see how overweight most of them are. Judging by the
girth of most of Everett's finest - I 'suspect' that many crimes could
be committed while the city sleeps, and the cops eat.

The first call of the shift was for a 'diff breather,' a fifty-ish year-
old male experiencing difficulty breathing. Upon arrival, we went up
two flights of stairs to the top floor of a triple-decker. A middle-aged
man was sitting on the floor of his living room, his back against an
easy-chair. His skin color was a dusky blue (positive Smurf-sign), and
he obviously was having a hard time breathing. I reached for his wrist
to check his pulse, while my partner applied an oxygen mask on him. I
listened to his lungs and heard a fine, wet, crackling noise every time
he tried to take a breath. Pulmonary edema. A condition where fluid from
your body gets trapped in the lungs, which slowly starts to fill. It's
kinda like drowning in a swimming pool - only you're in the living room.
That fine crackling noise was the sound of little bubbles of air
travelling through bronchial tubes filled with fluid. Try rubbing
together a bit of your hair, near your ear - that's the sound.

Anyway, he wasn't getting any air into his lungs. So the decision was
made to intubate him in the house. Ah, intubation. The so-called 'fresh-
air pipe,' the 'air piccolo' - this man would be playing it soon. Pam
set up the equipment, and made her first attempt. Since this guy was
still rather conscious, he objected to her trying to ram the equivalent
of a 'giant Pixie-stick' down his throat, and batted her away. She tried
again - and was rewarded by getting her glasses knocked-off. So it was
my turn.

He was now on his back, I kneeled near his head, Pam held on to both of
his hands. I slowly inserted the lighted 'blade' that would lift the
fleshy glottis, and illuminate my goal: the trachea. He promptly bit
down on the blade and started to twist his head back and forth. Joy.
Another crew had shown up at this time, and helped hold his head still.
I again inserted the blade, and was rewarded by the man's dinner - now
several hours digested. The menu? - pasta (well-chewed I was happy to
note), some bread, and a rich red marinara, with sun-dried tomatoes. The
heavy, sour smell of partially digested garlic and marinara rose to
tickle my nostrils. I avoided most of the onslaught by turning his head
to one side, unfortunately the side occupied by Pam, who was holding his
head still for me.

"Thanks a lot, asshole," she hissed at me, too soft for the family to
hear.

"But Pam, I thought you liked Italian food." - her glower deepened.

With all the struggling this man put up, he was beginning to tire. His
oxygen levels weren't that high in the first place, so in a short time,
his struggles lessened enough so that I could pass the tube through his
trachea and into his lungs. I knew I was in the lungs - as frothy white
stuff started to pour out of the tube, and onto the floor. The amount
this man put out was simply amazing. Some of the froth was pink -
indicating that I caused a 'leetle' trauma to his throat while trying
to pass the tube. Oh well.

We rolled him onto a 'scoop stretcher' and strapped him down, and began
the tedious process of trying to carry this two-hundred pound man down
two flights of stairs. The ironic thing throughout this whole process
was that since he was getting more oxygen now that he was intubated, his
level of consciousness rose - enough for him to get combative again.

Picture this: four people carrying a man on a flat metal board, the
man's hands have wiggled free from their restraints, and are trying to
reach and pull-out the plastic tube I just inserted. The people at his
side are trying to re-restrain his hands, but his arms waving wildly
about is causing the center of balance to shift, causing everyone
carrying him to rock back and forth - knocking over lamps and vases. His
wife scurrying this way and that saying "That's okay, don't worry about
it," with every new thing we knock over. _That's_ an EMS call - 'Every
Minute Sucks.'

After hauling him down the stairs, and knocking over some bric-a-brac
on the first floor as well - "That's okay, don't worry about it," we
finally get him into the ambulance - where I turn on the suction unit,
and suction out at least a liters worth of froth from his lungs.
Cleaning one of these suction units is a pain - fortunately we loaded
this guy into the other ambulance. Heh - I won't have to clean it.

We get to the hospital. And as we slide him off our 'scoop, we notice
that he has shit himself during transport. A long brown smear covers
our once shiny (and clean) metal board. I guess I have some cleaning to
do as well. Sigh - 'code brown' in progress.

That was call #1. The rest of the shift went downhill. Don't want to
talk about it - yet.

 
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