Divemedic

On top of all the high real estate taxes, falling property values, needing a translator to order breakfast at McDonald’s, the drugs, the crime, and all of the Yankees coming down here to tell us how to do things, the weather here in the summer is teh suck. It is hot, and dangerously humid. Our low temperatures are limited by the dew point, meaning that since the temperature cannot drop below the dew point (which is around 75DegF), we always start the day at 100% humidity. From there, we reach a high of about 95DegF. Combine that with our dew point, and you have a heat index of about 110DegF.

The problem here is I have no idea how they measure temperature. I am showing a current temperature of 103 DegF, while the official temp according to the weather service is only 91. Using my temperature the heat index calculates out to 119 DegF. The tropical sun beats down without mercy.

Here in Florida, there are 4 seasons:

Hot: March through May
F’ing Hot: June through mid September
Still Hot: Mid September through Mid November
Snow Birds: Mid November through February

What does all of this mean? It means that you can’t go outside from mid June to the middle of September without risking your health. It also means a $500 electric bill. (and I only keep the thermostat set at 78.)

Is breaking out the smart:

At present, federal revenue is fully consumed by three programs: Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. The rest of the federal government, including fighting two wars, homeland security, education, art, culture, you name it, veterans — the whole rest of the discretionary budget is being financed by China and other countries.

Consider an elderly widow, say 70 years old, with a modest retirement income of $18,000 living in a $300,000 house that’s fully paid for. She might receive local property tax forgiveness, medical and prescription drug subsidies and other federal, state and local subsidies based upon her age and income.

When subsidies are provided for this lady, whom are we truly benefiting? It’s not the lady but her heirs. Conceivably, the lady could make a deal with a financial institution to pay her property taxes, allow her to live in the house for the rest of her life and give her a lump sum cash settlement so that she can live without the handouts. Upon her death, the house becomes the property of the financial institution, not her heirs. Giving the widow handouts allows her to bequeath to her heirs her assets, a $300,000 house. If her children want to inherit the house, they, rather than taxpayers, ought to take care of their mother.

Read the whole thing.

During my last shift, I responded to an “Unknown Medical.” As we arrived, dispatch told us that the caller thought there was something wrong with her son, and he was hallucinating. When I opened the door, I saw a teen male who was covered in sweat and acting quite twitchy. Mom states that she took him in for his methadone injection, that they gave him 25 mg, and that he started acting funny about a half hour before, she also says that he has been with her all day and he has not had any other drugs. As she was explaining this, the teen kicked me in the balls, then the fight started.

Any fight that begins with a kick to the balls is going to get nasty. My first hit was a hammer fist to his brachial plexus. He didn’t even flinch. He hit me several more times, and kicked my knee fairly hard. I followed with hits to his abdomen, kidneys, and a hard punch to the throat. Then I closed the distance, managed to get a grip on his arm, and got him in a headlock. Since I outweighed him by about 100 pounds, I took us to the ground. My partner (remember Paramedic George?) then decided to join the pile. My attacker decided it was time to start biting, and threw an elbow into my stomach. I had had enough, and I really felt that I was in danger. I grabbed him by the trachea and choked off his air supply until he stopped fighting, then I let go.

The two minutes it took the first cop to get there seemed like forever. We handcuffed him to the stretcher. He still began to fight, and bent the rails of the stretcher. He stuck his hand down his pants and started masturbating in front of the female medic that came in on the second EMS unit. She reached out to stop him, and he grabbed her arm. I pushed very hard on his parotid gland and he let go. He fought us nearly the entire way to the hospital, until the drugs finally kicked in. It took 10mg of Haldol and 5mg of diazepam to calm him down. His heart rate was 190, he was too combative for us to get a BP, RR 40.

His tox screen showed cocaine, methamphetamine, the diazepam, and the methadone. The cops asked if I wanted to press charges, but I didn’t bother. The four times that I have pressed charges, the actors got probation and a fine. Besides, I know he is hurting at least as bad as I am at this point. My back, left knee, my balls, and elbows are pretty sore. I have been physically attacked more times than I can count during my career.

This illustrates a growing problem in EMS: 52% of all EMS responders report having been attacked on the job. According to the University of Maryland, the risk of nonfatal assault resulting in lost work time among EMS workers is 57 cases per 10,000 workers per year. The national average is about 1.8 cases per 10,000 workers per year. So the relative risk for EMS workers is about 30 times higher than the national average. This isn’t just EMS getting hurt: in 1999, the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated that 2,637 nonfatal assaults occurred to hospital workers–a rate of 8.3 assaults per 10,000 workers. Healthcare providers are twice as likely, and EMS workers 15 times as likely to be assaulted on the job than police officers or prison guards.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has identified violence in the medical setting as a potential hazard, and found the training of medical staff to identify and deal with potential violence ineffective. It is the the third leading cause of on the job injuries in EMS (only lifting patients and vehicle collisions injure more EMS workers) and the second leading cause of on the job fatalities (behind vehicle accidents), yet the only training we get is “don’t enter the scene unless it is safe.” This approach is obviously not working. There remains a reluctance on the part of EMS agencies and hospital administrators to provide training to effectively address workplace violence. Some may not recognize the extent of the problem, and thus don’t perceive the need for training personnel in basic defensive measures, while others erroneously perceive using defensive tactics as fighting, or a form of aggression.

My employer has no official position on self defense. Does yours?

On this date 65 years ago, the Mayor of Nagasaki placed himself in the history books by calling the Mayor of Hiroshima and exclaiming: “Did you see that shit? What the hell was that?”

For those apologists that think we should apologize for dropping the bomb, I remind you that the empire of Japan was a savage, warmongering people, whose soldiers killed 200,000 people and raped over 20,000 women and young girls during the winter of 1937-1938  in “The rape of Nanking”. Japan was hardly an innocent victim.
 

The New Beginnings Ministries church in Warsaw, Ohio has taken up the cause of harassing and protesting a local strip club. Click here to watch the video.

The strippers have responded by protesting and harassing the church goers.

What an asshole. That preacher needs to mind his own business. This is the key reason why I tune out conservatives every time they mention religion or the bible during a political debate. I don’t believe what you believe, I just want to be left alone, you hypocritical piece of crap.

I like looking at naked women, I like having an occasional drink, and I don’t care what you think about it.

In 2008, the best year that my wife and I have ever had financially, broke down like this:

We made a combined $106,743. To make this money, we both had jobs AND we ran our business.
We paid $6,932 in Social Security
We paid $1,621 in Medicare
We paid $12,506 in income tax
We paid $2,639 in property taxes
We paid $2,884 in Sales Taxes
The total of the above is  $26,582, and doesn’t include hidden taxes like 46 cents in taxes on each gallon of gasoline, and other taxes like cell phone taxes, fees, the matching half of our Social Security and Medicare taxes that are paid by our employer on our behalf, and other hidden costs. These direct taxes comprise 25% of our labor for the year.

Someone explain to me how forcing me to spend a quarter of my year working for others differs from forcing me to work as a slave for 10 of my 40 productive years.

The recent shootings in Connecticut were carried out by a man who called himself Thornton Omar Sharriff. You won’t see the press spending much time mentioning the fact that he was a Muslim.

Last night, there was a patient who called 911 and told dispatch that he thought someone had poisoned his drink. Now we get people who are mildly paranoid pretty frequently, but this one was different. The transport medic on this run thinks he has ten years experience. He has been on the job for two and a half years, but actually has one year of experience that he repeats over and over, because he learns nothing. Paramedic George has been precepted three times.

There was a couple on scene who told us that our 20 year old patient had a history of psychosis, had not taken his meds in weeks, and was on this night convinced that his parents were working with a demon to try and poison him. When I joined paramedic George in the back of the rig, the patient was already showing signs of aggression: he was trying to stare each of us down. Domination games. His thoughts are rambling between asking where his parents are, to making statements about how we are all doomed because Satan is coming.

By the time we get to the hospital, his statements have evolved to saying things like, “You are going to beat me up, aren’t you? You know you want to. WE both know where this is headed, so lets just get it over with.”

By then, there are 8 of us there, including the hospital staff. I look over at George, and he is standing in front of the patient, within arms reach, and is stretching and yawning with a full on, open mouthed, eyes closed yawn. The patient bowed up to fight, and an ER medic and myself jumped him before he could move. We wound up holding the patient down for some Haldol and some leather restraints.

Some people just never learn.