My plan today was to write a response to Baby Medic’s rant Bad Day — a rant I have had myself on too many a day, week, month and year — but in order to write what I really feel — about the privilege of this job despite all the bullshit — I need not to be having a bad day myself. The small stuff is getting to me. I hate coming to work and finding half used drug vials in the med kit. It says right on the side of the vial “Discard any used portion.” Multidose doesn’t mean multi-patient. How would you like to get 1.2 mg of narcan injected into you from the same vial that maybe an AIDS infected heroin addict received two injections from? Maybe another medic drew up 1.2 mg and gave an IM injection to the addict, and when that didn’t work, drew up another .8 from the same vial with the same syringe, and now you are lying unresponsive – maybe from a head injury — and your medic draws up the narcan from the same vial that either he or his EMT partner put back in the med kit because they either didn’t know you were supposed to dump the vial or they were too lazy to restock. And I should talk about leaving the ambulance a mess because while I do my best, I am not a rubber gloves up to the elbows, bleach and toothbrush in hand scrub everything till it isn’t there anymore kind of guy, but what happened to the hospital gowns I stock and how about a blanket? I have to climb my tired ass out of the ambulance, back to the laundry rack, grab a couple gowns and a thick blanket and instead of climbing back in to the ambulance, I just open the back door and toss the blanket and one gown on the stretcher and toss the other gown on the bench. I can put it on the shelf later. And who designed the houses in this town? Every one I have been to today is a split level. You have to walk up stairs to get in the house where you come in on a landing where you either have to go up more stairs or down stairs to get to your patient. And if they are in the back bedroom, you can’t get the stretcher in because the hallway is too narrow, and there is no turning radius. Let’s not even get into the size of the patients and their lifelong diet and eating habits. Or bathing habits for that matter. The Red Sox won a great game last night and now lead the World Series 2-0, yet I am angry that the game started so late and lasted so long that I got to bed way past my bed time and so I am tired and irritable this morning, instead of being grateful. And hey old Parkinson’s guy feeling a little weak with your companion a little too demented to give me any kind of rational history, why did you spend the night on the floor? And your batty doesn’t know she has Alzheimer’s yet companion didn’t call us to help you until this morning? And damn, even though you are not hurt, I can’t rightly leave you here and go back to my disturbed nap, my cheek pressed to the pillow, the blanket tucked up to my neck, me all curled up like a middle-aged baby. So I guess we have to take you in. If my partner can only get the stretcher in here. I am sorry I am apparently too tired and tangled with my own gripes to take in the awfulness of where life leaves once fierce vibrant people. Let’s get you up. Here’s my hand.
