Language barriers
Combined update tonight of yesterday and today. This may be kind of long and boring, but...
Yesterday we visited what is basically a haz-mat team that is comprised of personnel from LAS, the fire brigade, and the metropolitan police. They call it CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear). They took us out on the Thames on the LFB (London fire brigade) boat. This was awesome; we went all the way up (or down, depending) to Tower Bridge. I felt very touristy, taking a million pictures, but it was something that very few people get to experience.
After this we visited the EXPO, the explosives office. London is the only city in the UK that has a civilian bomb team. They respond to any suspicious thing and neutralize or minimize it. They have a museum of sorts filled with explosive devices; military, commercial, or homemade. All of these had been found in London which is pretty amazing. It was a little freaky when the guy was holding a hand grenade (with his index finger in the pin) and then began listing things using his fingers. (well, we respond to this, this, and oops!). The team mostly responds when people find old hand grenades that they don't know what to do with and also to incendiary devices left over from the last war. (a reminder of a history that Americans could never really understand) During WWII Germany dropped about 80 million incendiary devices on London. Luckily 1/4 were faulty (due to purposeful poor production by oppressed laborers). People are still finding them in gardens because they got imbedded in the dirt and forgotten for 60 years. Anyway...
We also saw their bomb robot which can neutralize bombs with other explosives (somehow that works). It is a really cool 'piece of kit' as they say. We also saw a video of it blowing up a lorry, (who doesn't love to watch things get blown up?).
Today I rode with an Emergency care practitioner (EPC). This is, in effect, an extended care paramedic who responds in a car. The theory is that they can provide more definitive care and either eliminate the need for ambulance transport, or get the patient directly to a general practitioner (GP). They don't have a real scope of practice yet, but it is in development. They will have prescription power, the ability to do more extensive diagnostic testing, stitching, and the like. It's a great idea, I think. More proof that LAS is better at recognizing problems and doing something about them.
I was talking to the EPC I was riding with about how sometimes I feel that I don't speak English here. It's not the accents, but the colloquial sayings that have no meaning to us. (but, at least I knew what the loo meant before I came here) Medical terms especially are challenging. Today we had a diabetic with a blood sugar of 24. Critically low, you may think, but here they measure it in millimoles or something bizarre like that so normal is 5-7. On my first call here the blood sugar check was 6.2. I thought they were nuts when no one seemed concerned about this.
When we returned tonight we were greeted by three new roommates. French guys who are here to find jobs and an apartment eventually. We've spent the last couple of hours talking to them using dictionaries, the google translator, and our other roommate who speaks French (how handy). It's been really cool. We were talking about French stereotypes, and as we mentioned baguettes and wine they all groaned. Funny.
Yesterday we visited what is basically a haz-mat team that is comprised of personnel from LAS, the fire brigade, and the metropolitan police. They call it CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear). They took us out on the Thames on the LFB (London fire brigade) boat. This was awesome; we went all the way up (or down, depending) to Tower Bridge. I felt very touristy, taking a million pictures, but it was something that very few people get to experience.
After this we visited the EXPO, the explosives office. London is the only city in the UK that has a civilian bomb team. They respond to any suspicious thing and neutralize or minimize it. They have a museum of sorts filled with explosive devices; military, commercial, or homemade. All of these had been found in London which is pretty amazing. It was a little freaky when the guy was holding a hand grenade (with his index finger in the pin) and then began listing things using his fingers. (well, we respond to this, this, and oops!). The team mostly responds when people find old hand grenades that they don't know what to do with and also to incendiary devices left over from the last war. (a reminder of a history that Americans could never really understand) During WWII Germany dropped about 80 million incendiary devices on London. Luckily 1/4 were faulty (due to purposeful poor production by oppressed laborers). People are still finding them in gardens because they got imbedded in the dirt and forgotten for 60 years. Anyway...
We also saw their bomb robot which can neutralize bombs with other explosives (somehow that works). It is a really cool 'piece of kit' as they say. We also saw a video of it blowing up a lorry, (who doesn't love to watch things get blown up?).
Today I rode with an Emergency care practitioner (EPC). This is, in effect, an extended care paramedic who responds in a car. The theory is that they can provide more definitive care and either eliminate the need for ambulance transport, or get the patient directly to a general practitioner (GP). They don't have a real scope of practice yet, but it is in development. They will have prescription power, the ability to do more extensive diagnostic testing, stitching, and the like. It's a great idea, I think. More proof that LAS is better at recognizing problems and doing something about them.
I was talking to the EPC I was riding with about how sometimes I feel that I don't speak English here. It's not the accents, but the colloquial sayings that have no meaning to us. (but, at least I knew what the loo meant before I came here) Medical terms especially are challenging. Today we had a diabetic with a blood sugar of 24. Critically low, you may think, but here they measure it in millimoles or something bizarre like that so normal is 5-7. On my first call here the blood sugar check was 6.2. I thought they were nuts when no one seemed concerned about this.
When we returned tonight we were greeted by three new roommates. French guys who are here to find jobs and an apartment eventually. We've spent the last couple of hours talking to them using dictionaries, the google translator, and our other roommate who speaks French (how handy). It's been really cool. We were talking about French stereotypes, and as we mentioned baguettes and wine they all groaned. Funny.
Comments
Glad you're having fun! Wish I were there for the hot French guys :)
have you met prince william yet???
i would have expected you to hunt him down and be engaged by now! :)