The Grind

Seven calls in eight hours in the city. Started off with two dialysis transfers. The problem with doing my overtime shifts during the day in the city is you can get slammed with transfers. Five of our seven calls were transfers -- the other two were an MVA and lady with a rectal bleed. One of our transfers was a round trip wait and return while the patient had a quick Cat scan. She required continual suctioning. Suctioning and lung secretions are nasty. I hate having to suction.

Working in the city has really changed from when I started. Back then, there were far fewer medics than there are now. Some days there were only one or two of us on. For a medic to do a routine transfer was unheard of. Even being sent to an ETOH was considered an insult. Every day you did at least one intercept with a basic unit who was screaming for a medic. Gradually as more medics were hired, and the company changed hands, transfers became more common. Now there are so many medics on -- intercepts are extremely rare and transfers are an everyday fact of the job. We all do transfers. Sometimes I actually prefer the transfers -- they are easy and make the day go by. A rainy day, I'd rather be doing transfers than getting soaked at an MVA. The only time it bothers me is when I'm sent on a transfer and a basic car is kept available, then the basic car gets sent to a chest pain, and they end up calling for a medic and there are no medics available.

I mention the transfers as away of introducing the topic of "dogging it." Because I don't have a regular partner for my overtime shifts, I get to work with many people, and they all have different attitudes about the job. And they all work at different speeds. One of my old partners used to kid me that I was the only one who sped back to the city from out-of-town trips, and that I would always clear when they needed a car. And when I'd clear, they'd just slam me with a transfer. I used to joke that I was a "company man." I meant that in the generic way that I took pride in getting to work on time, doing my job the way a job should be done.

There are different speeds at which you can work. No one can work at 110 all the time. I have found many of the people I work with slow down when they feel they are getting, in our parlance, "bent over," getting slammed with one transfer after another. So they slow down. They do their call, they write their paperwork, they hit the can, wash their hands, get something to eat, smoke if they smoke, say hi to someone they know, catch up a little, then they clear and do it all again.

The reality is a medic is a medic is a medic. You don't send the best medic, you send the closest one. I know some medics who have been on the streets longer than me -- good medics, the kind of people who you want coming in your house when you are sick -- and it seems sort of a waste to see them humping transfers all day while brand spanking new medics are sent to "the big bad one." (It's even worse when a basic unit is sent.) But how are brand spanking new medics going to learn if they don't get experience?

For some the day comes where what brought them to the job is no longer there. They don't feel respected for their ability and their don't get a chance to use what they know so they move on. Or maybe just when they are ready to hang it up, the good call comes in and they matter again, and that keeps them interested and satisfied. They feel the adrenaline again. They feel needed.

Me, I'm lucky, I have a suburban shift for my main post so that combined with the fact I work six days a week, I get enought "good" calls to keep me interested. In the suburbs, I am spared transfers, although I still do a lot of "emergifers", which are basically routine transfers from a nursing home to an ER that come in through the 911 system.

Sometimes it seems like a grind, but I still love my job. And as long as my check is good at the bank(and I still need it -- I do), I really can't complain too much.