You’re a new firefighter-paramedic and you are not fitting in. You are quiet, reserved. You lack the natural swagger of many of your co-workers. And you like the medic part of your job more than the fire. Your district mates give you a hard time about riding in calls they say you should have downgraded to the private ambulance crew. And you take too long to finish your charts. You know you are new and there is certain amount of hazing you can expect, but you are worried in your case, it may be crossing the line.
Then this happens. You back up another medic for a combative patient. The woman was found with a needle in her arm at a bus stop. She smells like piss and her arms are covered with sores and abscesses. A police officer gave her 4 milligrams of Naloxone intranasally (IN) shortly before the other medic arrived. The medic says the patient was still unresponsive so he gave her another 2 milligrams intramuscularly (IM). Now the patient is screaming and kicking and mother-fucking the other medic. You help hold her down with another firefighter while the girls on the ambulance crew starts restraining her with cravats. She keeps thrashing and tries to kick the medic. “Listen bitch,” he says. “You don’t shut up, I’m going to give you more Narcan!” She spits in his face. “I told you Bitch!” he says. He wipes the spit from his face, then out another Bristol Jet of naloxone and slams the needle in her arm. “You asked for it!”
Later at the station, the medic tries to justify his actions. “She was hypoxic, that’s what she was thrashing. She needed the Narcan.” The others are supporting him. One tells him, just make certain you document it carefully. “Fucking junkie,” he mutters. ”Bitch puked all the way to the hospital.” You are silent, and the medic looks at you. His eyes squint assessing you. He says nothing, but you feel the chill.
What you saw was wrong. You know it. The medic used Narcan as punishment. That was assault. You had a chance to speak up when it was happening, but you didn’t. You were complicit. Now you have a chance to talk to someone about it. Should you report him? Who to? Will anyone back you up? You remain silent.
Six months later, you resign for a out-of-state hospital based medic job. You vow to be a good a medic and person and to do right by your patients.