In a number of my duties I often find myself with EMTs who are straight out of school, bright eyed and bushy tailed about what as EMTs they can do. I’m sure more than one of them probably view me as grizzled and jaded when I burst their bubble that in EMS we actually don’t save lives. Perhaps we can extend them a bit (or at least the biological signs of it) but in the end the Reaper still gets his due. What we do is change the lives of those unable to change it for themselves in that moment, and hopefully we change it for the better. Do no harm and all that.
There was a comment that I seem to read and hear too often on the EMS1 Facebook Wall linking to my column on using Social Media to recognize the efforts of your responders.
Is it really ALL about the patient? I would venture to say no, it is not. If it were, why drill BSI and Scene Safety into every basic? If it were, why mandate road safety vests and have pull over laws? If it were, why shouldn’t we drive into active shootings with abandon? Afterall it’s all about the patient, right?
No, it actually isn’t. The fact we do those things above proves that since it is putting our well being above that of the patient’s. It is done this way so we can remain physically safe and continue to perform our duty hopefully until retirement or at least until our backs no longer work as an ordinary back would. While I wouldn’t quite classify us as good just yet, we are getting better at maintaining our physical well being and health. Making good healthy food affordable for those working on an EMTs salary and the full unequivocal of tobacco would probably bring us closer to that goal than we care to admit.
While we have advanced the care of our physical selves, we ignore our mental and emotional health. Why is that? More importantly, why do we feel that is okay?
I view this as the biggest threat to EMS right under reduced reimbursements and right above motor vehicle collisions. I think the mental and emotional tolls costs us more providers in a year than what we would want to admit. I think if that true number was known, we would be shamed by it… and we should be. While it is important to care for the patient we also need to be caring for one another, and there is a tremendous lack of that going on… at least from my perspective.
What do you think? Can we continue to sustain an industry that mentally and emotionally wears its providers from a love of the job to a seething hate or is this just as big a threat as not wearing your seatbelt in the ambulance? Feel free to answer in the comments…
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IMHO EMS has never gained traction as a profession precisely because the mental, emotional and I would add moral, philosophical and spiritual aspects of the work are not acknowledged. Culmulatively, they add pressure on to an already technically-topheavy job and within five years they say now, it’s burned out of the field for most.
The human aspect of the work has largely gone neglected but I don’t want you to miiss this, Dave; medics are starting to talk to each other about real things such as these on-line. I’m involved with the largest on-line community in EMS and much to my surprise and delight, I see an increase in both participation and mutual support.
Personally, what I hope to be seeing is the “culture” of EMS evolving into a profession where compassion lives. Not only for the patients but for each other. Ultimately, I think it’s going to have to be the medics themselves who develop ways to support each other in these areas, primarily because no one understands this weird world we work in better than us!