Just Point

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Wednesday I had my first shift in a neighboring Maryland county. It was really nice. We had two chest pains in a row and later in the day we had a cardiac arrest in a nursing home. It wasn’t dispatched as such so we brought in the traditional ‘baggage.’ As we went down the hall, all of the employees simply looked at us and then pointed in the general direction of the room. Every single employee, not excitedly, but quietly pointed. We were almost to the room when I thought to myself, we should have brought the monitor.
We found the patient conveniently placed right behind the room door with CPR in progress. He should have been suctioned probably 10 minutes before we got there, but alas. We took over, I put him on the monitor and my preceptor went for the tube. I was initially jealous of his position (it was merely more convenient in that ridiculous space in which we had to work for him to attempt the tube) but my jealousy quickly dissipated when what looked to be an easy tube became a difficult, wet, and smelly tube. The patient was in asystole the whole time, I pushed the drugs and tried to help with the tube, which soon became a lost cause. We arrived at the hospital in about 2 minutes, and the doc climbed aboard a called it right there.

Tomorrow, I head back home for another MSP helicopter shift, from now until Thanksgiving I have a clinical or work every other day, I can't wait!
Yesterday I had a scary realization when I received an e-mail reminding me to fill out my FAFSA (free application for federal student aid) for the 06-07 year. I did a double-take when I realized that I don’t need to fill that out anymore (not that it’s been much help.) That’s pretty freaky.

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