We Have A Drug For That

We were toned out for a woman not feeling well. This seems to be a catch all from dispatch. If they can't figure out what's wrong they must just not be feeling well.

On scene we found an 75 year old woman that, surprisingly enough, wasn't feeling well.

She was fairly typical as far as her medical history. Some hypertension, high cholesterol, diabetes, low thyroid....the usual. She had been taking 8 medications for her ailments and hadn't been having any issues.

The old lady (yes mom and dad, 75 is old) had gone to her primary care physician a couple of days earlier for her annual physical. She was unclear as to what new medical problems her doctor had discovered but she left his office his office with 6 new medications.

Like a good patient she went and got all of her new scripts filled. Unfortunately she either had a bad reaction to one of her new medications or the combination of one or more of  them. Now she has to go through the process of trying to find out what drug is screwing things up.

Another reason to try and live more healthy now. But in case you don't want to or it's too late for that don't worry, they probably have a drug for that too.

Hate Shots? This One's For You

Here's an interesting article from Popular Mechanics that describes how we are going to be getting rid of needles...at least for giving shots.

I found this article interesting since we just went through our infectious disease control class. One of the biggest improvements for us in the medical field as far as engineering controls to stop the spread of infectious diseases was the adoption of a needle-less system for medication administration through IVs. This may help in much the same way.

When Snoring Really Isn't Good

0200. The lights clicked on and the speakers came to life. "Engine 51, medical aid...." I slipped out of bed and made my way toward the apparatus bay. I donned my bunker pants and slid into my seat, still trying to shake the cobwebs from my mind.

Arriving on scene we found our patient laying in bed. His wife told us that she called when she couldn't wake him up. The first thing to pop into my mind was that his blood sugar was low. It's always the sugar. My patient was breathing but his tongue was partially occluding his airway causing him to snore. I think that's what woke his wife up in the first place.

While I dealt with his partial airway obstruction my engineer grabbed the glucometer. The guys blood sugar was 35. Told you it's always the sugar.

I reached into the drug box and grabbed an IV start kit. My engineer spiked my IV bag and had it waiting for me when I needed it. While I was taping down my IV AMR showed up so I told them we had a hypoglycemic patient. The medic, trying to be helpful I'm sure, stepped up to the bedside. In doing so he managed to come between me and my drug box.

I asked the medic if he would grab the dextrose for me since he was in the way. After cleaning up the trash from my IV start (I had time since I assumed the AMR medic was taking care of the low blood sugar) I Reassessed my patient to see if he was coming around. He wasn't. It was about this point that I noticed the box for the pediatric dosage of dextrose on the bed.

I asked the medic if that's what he administered. He said yes. I then asked again if he gave D25 to the elderly gentleman. Again, an affirmative response. Since he wasn't getting my point I simply asked my engineer for the other dose of D25. Then the AMR medic realized what he had done and apologized. I can only assume that he was tired too. It was after 0200.

With the second dose of sugar on board the patient started to come around. He was still confused but he was improving. We helped AMR get him to the rig and cleaned up the rest of our mess. Time to head back to the barn.