Just Take a Shower

Apparently, this isn't just advice given to horny teenagers who have watched too many episodes in a row of "Dollhouse" on Hulu. Now, paramedics are giving the advice, to mothers of sick children, and people are dying.

On February 10th, paramedics responded to a home in Washington, D.C. The 5 a.m. call came in as a report of a child having difficulty breathing. The paramedic advised the child's mother to "run a hot shower" and have the child stand in it, to "clear out her lungs." Then, the ambulance left.

Eight hours later, another call went out from the same house. Difficulty breathing. Medics showed up again, and this time they transported the child, who died.

The female paramedic, who responded to the first call and gave her fatal advice to the family never filled out any paperwork concerning the first response, and she did not transport the child. Not only that, she did not have the adults present even fill out and sign a Refusal of Transport form, which is standard operating procedure in all emergency responses. Don't want to go to the hospital? If you're of sound mind and body, that's fine, but the law states that you have to be clearly informed of the risks of not seeking hospital care, and you must obtain a signature on that form, which will absolve you of responsibility when the patient up and dies ten minutes later.

Maybe it's because I'm gearing up for a return to the streets as an EMT, maybe it's because I'm working towards becoming a father, but I have nothing in my heart but disdain, disgust, and outright hatred for the behavior of this supposedly veteran paramedic who, to my unpleasant understanding also serves as a preceptor-- an instructor and mentor for newly-minted paramedics. Not only should she be stripped of her credentials-- she should be stabbed repeatedly with the badge pin. Here's a newsflash:

Everybody. Goes. To. The. Hospital.

Always. Transport.

Always.

It's not just a suggestion-- it's policy. When someone calls 911, and you show up, they go. If they don't want to go, and they're not whackier than an opium-laced Ritz cracker, they must sign the form-- otherwise, it's transport time. This EMS disaster happened for one reason and one reason only: laziness. This bitch didn't feel like schlepping this kid to the hospital. She was cocky and arrogant and, above all else, goddamn lazy. She just didn't feel like transporting, which, by the way, is just about the sum total of her fucking job that she shouldn't even be allowed to have anymore.

It's your job, sister. Don't like it? There's probably a UPS truck somewhere out there with your name on it. And you'll never have to worry about the boxes dying on you.

I understand apathy. I understand sometimes not giving a shit. I understand being overworked and being underpaid and incompetent supervisors riding your ass about bullshit-- poorly maintained equipment and trucks are all scratched and dented up and smell like old mustard. I understand stupid partners, and irrational dispatchers, and working outside in the goddamn wind and the rain and the blazing heat-- lifting Big Ass Bertha up three goddamn flights of stairs, or down. I know. It's a pain. But, if you wake up one morning and find that you just don't care enough to do even the bare minimum of your job-- throw the kid in the back of the truck and put two liters of oxygen on her and drive her to a fucking hospital that's probably less than ten minutes away, and then fill out some paperwork after you hand her over to the nurses-- well, then you're just nothing but a stinky old piece of shit.

EMS is a little too important to be left to the dregs of society, the people who can look into the eyes of the parents of a two-year-old little girl and tell them to run a hot shower because you'd rather go out and get coffee or talk on the cellphone inside your truck. It's a little too important. And maybe that's the savior in me talking-- maybe that's part of the reason I'm going back. Because I may not take the most accurate blood pressures in the world, and I'm not totally up-to-date on all my medical abbreviations, but I'm pretty sure that my ethics and my logic are still largely intact.

Everybody goes to the hospital.

Everybody.

Ladies & Gentlemen, Make Way for Robo-Medic

I first became worried that the robots were going to take over for you and me when they began installing self-check out lanes at the grocery store. Even though they still need a supervisor to be on-hand to scope out the scene for thieves and imbeciles, it's pretty much just you and the scanny-thingy. Although my interactions with grocery store clerks are often rote, formulaic and exasperating, we're still fostering the bonds of human interpersonal communication. Even the clerk who tried to talk to me about baseball was doing a yeoman's job of forging ahead with the luminous and lofty goal of human contact.

And good for him.

It's easy to forget, though, that robots have been around for a while. They've been pretty much building our cars for a while now. That cute little Roomba bastard is soon going to replace Consuela, the green-card coveting house-wench who has to take the bus to your 4br, 2ba brick colonial from her rickety rowhome en el barrio. And I'm quite sure that the Japanese are, right at this moment, working out the schematics for a life-sized, self-lubricating companion.

And good for them.

But if the preponderance of ATMs, automated car-washes, and cyber-waiters isn't enough to convince you that the era of human dominance is at an end, I present you with the Lucas 2.

Yes, ladies & gents: it's an automated CPR machine, and not only is it better than you, it's better than the Lucas 1.

Because I am an emergency medical technician living in the heady daze of street-retirement, I still sometimes get emails from a website called http://www.jems.com/, which is the official website of the Journal of Emergency Medical Services. They have interesting, engaging articles about medics who get into roadside brawls with state troopers, news about continuing education and re-certification, the latest advances in treating Diabetty and Heart Attack Jack and, yes, product announcements. Products like the coolest new blue whacker light-bar for you to put on top of your Dodge Caravan, or cool perforated leather gloves you can wear so your grip doesn't slip while you're lifting a stretcher containing 520-pound Bertha McSupersize. Products like the Lucas 2.

Folks, the era of automated, robotic CPR has arrived.

So, here's the deal. You're eating dinner at Windsor Palace. Sir Cerebral Strokesalot goes down while consuming his leg of mutton that is embossed with the likeness of Elizabeth II. The fire brigade is summoned but you, with your quick-thinking and cunning skills, notice a box on the wall that is marked "LUCAS 2: Break Glass Only In Emergency." You run over to it. Being British, you are consumed with guilt at smashing an object and causing a disturbance, so you gently tap on the glass with your shrimp fork until it shatters. You remove the Lucas 2, which looks very much like a pogo stick for midgets, and you race over to Sir Strokesalot. You plop the thing on top of his sternum and press the button that says "Press Here to Wake the Dead," and the Lucas 2 goes into action. Up and down that thing goes like a sonofabitch. There are horrified gasps from the crowd. Ladies swoon, and so do the men, because they're all English and gay and shit. The fire brigade finally comes and they're all like, "Oy! What's all this then!?" And you'll be all like, "Look! Me and Lucas 2 revived this twiggy motherfucker!" And then you'll be hanged for using language like that in front of the Queen, you bloody vulgarian.

Yeah. So, seriously-- there's a CPR machine.

Be afraid.

I don't know how I feel about it. Part of me is looking at it from the point of view of a collapsing civilian which, as an incurable hypochondriac, I'm always afraid of becoming, and the other part of me is looking at it from the perspective of a pre-hospital provider, which I was and, though inactively still am, and may one day be again. Who knows? The potentially collapsing civilian in me is very skeptical of this thing because, if a normal person doing chest compressions is liable to break a few of my brittle, ginger ribs, a fucking machine is probably going to break all of them.

The pre-hospital provider in me is skeptical of this machine because it seems like a very expensive way to do the same thing that human beings can do anyway. Yes, the machine doesn't get tired after thirty minutes of chest compressions like humans would but, realistically, if you're doing CPR on someone for thirty minutes either by yourself or with a machine-- stop and face facts: he's fucking dead, so what's the difference if the machine can go on and on for an hour and not get "tired?" Any pre-hospital provider who has a shred of honesty or intelligence will tell you that that CPR without the assistance of an Automated External Defibrillator has an extremely low/poor success rate-- so, why spend the money when you can just as easily send two EMTs to the scene making $11.00/hr to bang on somebody's chest? It's just one more thing that has to be inspected every year, can break and requires man hours to train people how to use.

I mean, forget the automatic chest-compression device. What would really be great would be an air compressor attached to a pair of robot lips so that you wouldn't have to put your mouth on some Herpes-scabbed homeless motherfucker. Now that's a CPR machine I'd support.

Of course, you know perverts would just buy it for their own sordid purposes.

And good for them.

1st, Meditation. 2nd, Medication.

On Friday morning, some asshole in a gold Ford Taurus cut me off. He had an Emergency Medical Services license plate and whacker antennas all over his car.

"I probably know this asshole," I thought to myself as I sped up to see if I was right.

Turns out, I was kind of right. It was a d-bag from my old ambulance company, but I didn't really know him. I recognized him, but I didn't know him. He was wearing a white shirt, which indicated his position as a supervisor.

Supervisors at my old ambulance company are no different than supervisors at other jobs: they're generally incompetent, inefficient, ineffectual, slovenly, lazy, and borderline retarded. Put a white shirt on a guy and automatically deduct thirty IQ points. It's like magic.

Seeing this dumbass inspired me to pick up my cell-phone and call one of my old partners to check in and see how she was doing. I call Topia maybe twice a year, and we pick up right where we left off, like no time had passed at all. She and I were steady partners for around a month-and-a-half, and then worked together sporadically. I started on the truck with her when my partner got fired and her partner was out on disability after being tackled by a deranged psych patient who had broken free of his restraints.

Though we only worked together for a relatively brief time, we got to know each other very well, and became good friends. I helped her move from not one, but two apartments during the time I worked at the company-- the first time lifting enormous heavy black lacquer furniture that weighed as much as a small condominium. The only reason I helped her move the 2nd time was that she had gotten rid of that fucking furniture.

"Good," I said, "because if you think I'm moving that shit again, then you're one crazy, black dyke."

Topia is, in fact, an African-American lesbian. She's not especially crazy, though, but her girlfriend is. Topia has a huge, gorgeous smile, huge breasts and a huge, wild mane of beautiful curls. I don't know if the hair is real or not-- I don't exactly know how black peoples' hair works. Is it all weaves? I have no idea. I'm pretty sure the breasts are real.

Anyway, Topia was overjoyed that I called her on Friday.

"I can't believe you remembered my birthday!" she squealed.

"Um, I didn't," I admitted. I was a day late anyway-- she turned 29 on Thursday. She promised to call me on May 13th.

She caught me up on all the company gossip, which I absolutely love. It's like tuning in to a TV show you used to watch religiously, but don't always have time for anymore-- so you watch once in a while, just to catch up on your favorite characters.

George and Sarae, long-time partners on the street and in the bedroom, finally got married, after George sired Sarae's baby back in 2006.

"Did you go to the wedding?" I asked.

"No, they had it on a Tuesday at 5:30pm," she said.

"I didn't know you could get married on Tuesdays."

"Yeah, well, they probably did it because it's cheaper," Topia said. "Of course, I probably could have made it to the wedding because-- you know black people-- the thing didn't start until 7:30. Sarae was an hour-and-a-half late."

"Oh, they were on BPT," (Black People Time, a phrase I learned from Topia.)

"That's right," she said, laughing. "BPT."

I asked her how it was working with Brad. That's not his real name, but I'm calling him "Brad" because his voice is identical to that dunderheaded bass voice of Brad Garrett, the brother from "Everybody Assrapes Raymond." Brad is approximately 6'4" and has a streamlined, bald head shaped like a big, bloated bullet. Brad's a paramedic and I worked with him on several occasions and I always dreaded it. Brad always made me drive him to L.A. Fitness in the ambulance so he could go in and work out for an hour and leer at women. This was, of course, against company policy (the working out while on duty-- I don't think there was anything in the P&P manual about leering at women) and I was always paranoid that we would get an emergency call while Brad was in there pumping himself.

He would also relish in telling me all about how smart he was, how great he was with money, and how he had figured himself out emotionally. He also loved badmouthing his baby mama. He called their spits, spats and other assorted goingsons, "Baby Mama Drama."

"Brad?" Topia said, "Oh, Brad's great. He's big into self-actualization now. You know, all that bullshit. He's always reading Deepak Chopra to me, and mispronouncing all the key phrases and words. He's also big into meditation. He meditates all the time. And he has a new catchphrase, too," she said.

"Oh, yeah? I can't wait to hear this. What is it?"

"Judge not," said Topia. "Judge not."

"Right, I'll remember that."

Topia told me that Brad has been making meditation audiocassettes for some bullshit franchisee operation run by some phony Yogi who Brad pays to get a license to peddle his shit.

"I'm going to retire off this," he says.

"He plays these tapes while we're transporting patients," Topia said to me on the phone, as we were both cracking up, "I swear to God, he makes me play them while he's in the back with a patient. So I have to hear is big, stupid voice going, "Breathe deeply. Be calm. Judge not."

"He does this while someone's having a heart attack?" I asked, incredulous.

"Oh, no," Topia said. "Brad doesn't actually believe that these people are having heart attacks anymore. He thinks that they are having a poor mind/body connection and that they need to meditate."

"Oh, my God. Why doesn't he just quit being a paramedic and walk around in sandals, a turban and a blanket and just touch peoples' crotches and heal them?"

"That medic money's too good."

"Right."

She told me that, a week ago they were transporting a patient who was in the midst of an active myocardial infarction (at least, that's what normals would call it. Brad probably just thought the guy needed a chakra realignment). During the transport, the patient made the very ominous statement, "Uh.... I don't feel so good."

Now, when normal people in the course of their regular day say, "Uh.... I don't feel so good," that usually means that they've got vertigo or a headache or, at the very worst, they might throw up. When a patient in the back of an ambulance on 5 IV drips and a cardiac monitor says, "Uh.... I don't feel so good," you can pretty much start the countdown.

"You're fine," said Brad dismissively. I can just picture Topia's eyes bulging out of their sockets in the rearview mirror.

Two or so minutes later, the cardiac monitor made a noise that indicated that the patient probably wasn't fine. Brad moved over to the bench seat next to the patient, which he never does. He prefers to sit in the captain's chair and nap during most transports.

"When I saw him move over to the bench seat, I couldn't believe it. I thought he was about to start medic'ing this guy up. But he didn't."

"Listen," Brad said, "I want you to mediate with me."

"What?" the patient said, appropriately confused.

"Trust me, okay? You're fine. Just close your eyes and meditate with me. Breathe in slowly, and breathe out slowly. And go 'Uhmmmmmmmm.....' Uhmmmmmmmm...........' Come on, you can do it. Now, look at the light. Go towards the light."

"But I don't wanna go towards the light!" cried the petrified patient.

"No, not that light! The white light. The calming white light. It's a good light, not a bad light."

Because the patient was not cooperating with Brad's less-than-traditional methodology, Brad decided to try a different tactic.

"I guess I'll take your blood pressure."

Normal blood pressure is 120/80. This gentleman's pressure was 70/30, meaning that he was basically bottoming out. His ship wasn't sinking, it was fucking a coral reef.

"Oh, shit," said Brad, obviously surprised that his uhmmmmmmmming wasn't working its magic. He immediately discontinued the patient's nitroglycerin and administered another drug to boost the patient's pressure. Miraculously, he felt better.

When they delivered the patient, who was thankfully alive, to the cardiac cathertization lab, Brad gave a report to the nurses. I had assumed that he would have left out the part about where he tried to get to Nirvana with the patient, but he didn't.

"You... meditated with him?" one of the nurses asked, her eyes narrowing.

"Well, I tried-- but he wasn't into it. He wasn't ready."

"Well," said another nurse, "when all else fails, medication is always a good last-ditch option. Don't forget, you are a paramedic."

"Yeah," Topia said to me, "Brad's real popular with the nurses. Just yesterday we were taking a patient in the truck, and a nurse had to ride with us because the guy was on so many medications, and Brad was in the back having a high old time with the nurse."

"I'll bet."

"Yeah, he was telling her all about his baby mama and how he calls his kid "retard," and how he cured his high cholesterol with meditation-- oh, and Crestor. And I said, 'No, Brad-- that wasn't the meditation, it was the Crestor.' And he got all pissed, because I was embarrassing him in front of this nurse, and he said, 'No, Topia-- the the meditation allowed the Crestor to work on my body.' And then, everything was quiet for a minute, and he pipes up with, 'You know, I've had a vasectomy!'"

"WHAT?!" I howled.

"Yeah! Just like that! And the nurse goes, 'What is that, your pick-up line?' And Brad goes, 'Well, no-- but don't you find that attractive?'" And the nurse goes, "Uh, no, I don't.'"

Stupid bitch. Her chakra must be all fucked up.

Judge not.

The Antihero's Hero

First, there was Captain Chesley Sullenberger, III, who landed an airplane gracefully upon the waters of the Hudson River, saving the lives of every scared passenger on board.

Now, there's Captain Richard Phillips, who gave himself up as the sole hostage in the Somali pirate drama, saving the lives of every scared crewmember on the Maersk Alabama.

We do seem to love our Captains in this country lately: men in uniform who are at the helm of some large piece of transportation equipment. Perhaps, in the next couple months, we will be hailing the actions of a train conductor in his mid-fifties for some amazing act that he will then modestly downplay at a press-conference. Or perhaps the Captain of the QE II will be nationally lauded for single-handedly procuring more shrimp cocktail for an elderly matriarch at a Saturday night dress-up dinner event.

Don't get me wrong-- I'm not trying to take anything away from these guys, I just think it's kind of a funny phenomenon (you know, like LMT stories!) and, as you know, it's my job as a blogger to identify funny phenomena and exploit them for my own nefarious purposes.

I have to say, though, that, for all their obvious heroism, I kind of wish heroes would own up to it more. It gets kind of annoying to listen to heroes being interviewed and denying that they're heroes. I mean, come on. Shut the fuck up already. With Sullenberger, it was, "Oh, no, my vo-pilot and crew are the real heroes." Then it was, "Well, all the tugboat operators who immediately dropped what they were doing and came to our aid-- they're the heroes." And, "The NYPD and the FDNY are the real heroes."

With Phillips, the mastubatory debate rages about whether Phillips was the hero, or whether the crew was the hero, or whether the Navy SEALS who blew the heads off the pirates were the heroes. In a CBS News story (which, by the way, referred to Captain Phillips as "Captain Courageous" which was enough to make me vom) published online yesterday, the word "hero" or "heroism" is used seven times.

"I'm just the byline," Phillips said, "the real heroes are the Navy SEALs, those who have brought me home."

Well, goll-y. Why are we so obsessed with who the "real" hero is? Can't there be more than one? If someone is a "real" hero, doesn't that imply that someone else is a "fake" hero? Why is it that we have come to demand false modesty as the automatic response of people that we nationally and unabashedly adulate? It's a routine, a tradition, it's... foreplay.

It's a script.

"I was just doin' my job."

You can't be a hero and not say that to a reporter, I'm sorry. This country will not permit that. And you can't say "doin-g" either: it's "doin,'" Captain Heroman. You are required by law to say it like that because we need all our heroes to sound like John Wayne and, if you're too bookish and add the "g" on to the end of "doin'" well, you've just got too much learnin' for us reg'lar folk who need more down-to-earth heroes.

We know you were just doin' your job, ma'am. But, can't you be doin' your job and be a hero at the same time? Why does one have to preclude the other? There are plenty of people who put on a uniform and "just do their job" but will never act in a heroic way. The people who clock in at 8am and leave at 4pm are "just doin' their job." You're doin' your job and being a hero. And... hey: that's okay.

Oh, and if you're addressing a female reporter, you are also required to add, "ma'am" to the end of your statement. Them's the rules, pard'ner.

I just wish that one day a police officer would rescue a drowing victim from a raging flood, or a fireman would rush out of an inferno clutching a set of twins and a litter of puppies, or a paramedic would successfully perform CPR on the Queen and have the courage to stand before a camera and answer the ridiculous question, "Do you think you're a hero?" with the statement,

"Well, yeah.... Obviously. Look at what the fuck I just did."

Heroism in this society is pretty downright silly. You're only allowed to be a hero if you categorically deny you are one, even if it's absurdly obvious that you are one. When you're a loser, a criminal or a bastard, everybody wants you to own up to it. When you're a hero, nobody wants you to own up to it.

Captain Phillips is coming home to Vermont today, where he will receive a hero's welcome.

But only if he claims he doesn't deserve it.