EMS to lose Rescue Truck

[Wake up Grady County]

In a move that surprises no-one familiar with Grady county stupidity, the dumba$$ county commission has decided to take the rescue truck from EMS, give it to the county fire dept, hire a full time fireman to run it Monday thru Friday, and let a volunteer man it nights, weekends, and holidays. Not to mention they are cutting EMS back from 5 people per shift to 4.
What does this mean for Grady County?
Firstly, if you have a wreck after hours or weekends, you will be forced to wait on a volunteer to come from home to the station, grab the truck and come to extricate you from your smashed vehicle.
Secondly, if both ambulances are out on calls, you will sit waiting until one gets free before you get any medical assistance. Before you would get a medic on the rescue truck who could stabilize you until such time, but now, SOL.
Then there is the problem of having to send an ambulance to fire calls in the county instead of rescue, thus reducing your available ambulances to one.
Grady county EMS runs more calls per ambulance that does Thomas county, Mitchell county, and Decatur county, who all run more than two trucks per shift.
Instead of cutting your throats, why don't the citizens of Grady county stand up to Charles Renauld and Rusty Moye and demand that EMS be either allowed to keep the Rescue truck, or add another person for a total of 6 medics and run three trucks per shift.
It is your families lives that they are playing with.

[muggy]

why don't they put the rescue truck in whigham
why the people want have too wait for a ambulance to come from cairo it take to long and they could died before they get there

[Sowega guy]

The county is doing cut backs like everyone else. 80% of the time the county fire department is covering rescue because there is not enough personnel working @ ems to even cover the rescue and no a volunteer would not have to come to the station to get the rescue truck there would be qaulified people that would be running the rescue at nite. At nite time it usually takes looker for the rescue truck to be rolling from ems that it does for a fire truck to be enroute to the scene of a vehicle wreck or a structure fair.

[Just a Medic]

Having worked in Shady Grady up until June, I do believe your facts are in error. Because I worked every third day at EMS and we never NEVER had fire cover for us more than 2 or 3 hours at a time. By the way, the plan is to station the truck at Cairo County Vol station which is just across the road, so where is the time savings in that?
And I challenge your slanderous statements that it takes longer for EMS to respond than it does firefighters. Been there, done that, and we responded just as fast as your fire fighters did.
Trust me, it's going to be a goat rope.

[Curious about Cairo]

Can the all people working the rescue truck handle/run the equipment(j.o.l. etc) by themselves?

[Are we there yet]

I was out the other night and saw the EMS driving around lost. In the words of Wake up Grady " It is your families lives that they are trying to find "

[Just a Medic]

Curious about Cairo wrote:

Can the all people working the rescue truck handle/run the equipment(j.o.l. etc) by themselves?

Unfortantly NO, because the county won't spend the money to train them and hire qualified people.

[Just a Medic]

Are we there yet wrote:

I was out the other night and saw the EMS driving around lost. In the words of Wake up Grady " It is your families lives that they are trying to find "

First, how do you know they were lost.

Secondly, if all the idiots in Shady Grady would comply with the 911 law, and put their DAMN house numbers out where they are visible, it would make it easier.

Thirdly, if 911 dispatch gives out the wrong address, WTF do you expect.

And last but not least, get woken up a 3 am, run out in less than a minute and take off going somewhere you've never been, directed by someone sitting in another county at a desk, with fog, drunk drivers, and sleep filled eyes and see how well you do.

[Are we there yet]

1. They were LOST because they couldn't find a street in the CITY.(Get a dictionary and look up the word map)

2. Agree with street numbers but you can't find a house if you are on the WRONG STREET (ref: previous dictionary)

3. If you don't want to get woke up at 3 am, can't read a map, have problems with fog, drunk drivers, sleep filled eyes or just generally wine alot about stuff you are expected to do, GET ANOTHER JOB.

[Lost in Space]

Amen

[Just a Medic]

Are we there yet wrote:

1. They were LOST because they couldn't find a street in the CITY.(Get a dictionary and look up the word map)
2. Agree with street numbers but you can't find a house if you are on the WRONG STREET (ref: previous dictionary)
3. If you don't want to get woke up at 3 am, can't read a map, have problems with fog, drunk drivers, sleep filled eyes or just generally wine alot about stuff you are expected to do, GET ANOTHER JOB.

I never said I didn't want to be woken up at 3 am, I said if you think its so easy, try it.
I don't whine about my job, I enjoy it. But if you are so great, why don't you try mine.
Its easy to sit on the side and armchair quarterback, but like the saying goes. Those that can DO, those that can't Coach.

[Grady]

I would like to comment on this thread. I work at EMS and have an opinion about rescue. I have been to 8 GEMA extrication courses, 2 rescue specialist courses, and of course during EMT and Paramedic school we trained with vehicle extrication. My comment is not saying are we trained....By the way of course we are. Are you asking are there different people here who are more trained and familiar with our tools than others, of course. The same way that there are volunteers out there who are more trained than others. What happens is you will have someone show up on a scene and start grabbing things and want to go cutting and prying and saying all around their department, whether it be fire or ems, about how much better they did it than others could...blah blah.

[Grady]

Let me tell everybody a story. On afternoon, cold windy and rainy, a bunch of teenage kids crossed over the yellow line passing a car on a curve on Hwy 111 South and hit an on-coming car head on. Now this is not recent by the way. This is years ago, you know back when fire and EMS got along. On this scene Three kids basically got crumpled in a small car. BEFORE any extrication could be attempted we had to gain access to the car so that steps could be performed to stabilized these patients. The reason why, imagine that there is a reason, is because on 14 year old teenager had a broken neck - and no, a fire fighter did not know this - because he did no patient assessment. Had this patient moved even an inch he would of been paralyzed from the neck down to this day. Cutting up a car is about more than taking it apart. Its about the patient or patients. I don't care who does it, but I will tell you this. Go on and go to cutting before these patients are stabilized and you will see rage. And no I don't mean by EMS, because shoot, who cares about EMS anyway. I'm talking about the emergency room doctor who will take this patient and wants to know all details about the scene so that he knows what the injury pattern is...

[Grady]

By this way, this is the man or woman who can make your like miserable or happy. I'm talking about the trauma surgeon who will walk into that trauma room to prep for surgery and can tell how long that injury has been there, and yes that also means did it happen in the wreck, or due to improper handling? I'm talking about the lawyer who wants to know why. EMS and fire need to be a team. If you want to ask me a question about does EMS want to keep extricating?? The answer to that would be EMS doesn't give a crap about those stupid hurst tools that by the way are from the 1970's maybe yall should use those when you go to extricate instead of your shiny new ones that weigh only half of what those do. What EMS wants is to not lose 3 fulltime positions. Your response is going to be "Well we all have to make budget cuts"... Hummm... Try these pants on for size and lets see where the money would be wasted. EMS RUNS 250 - 300 CALLS PER MONTH ------

[Grady]

R1 - Hum lets see, there are about maybe 10 extrications a year - R1 is used mostly for running extra calls when all ambulances are on calls, backup on critical patients, O and by the way, no firefighters cannot do that, you are not trained to do the procedures that paramedics can. R1 typically handles 10 to 30 patients a months. I guess when this happens people will just have to wait. Ask me if I care and care went out the window years ago. Ask me if I want a power struggle on scene and I will tell you I no longer give a crap, but then ask me if I will cover for you in my medical report, which is an official legal document and part of that patients medical record, reviewable by all RN's Doctors and Surgeons. Reviewed by their lawyers and admissable in a court of law and I will tell you, No, I will not lie. I will document what I see on scene and tell exactly how that patient was extricated. Because remember now, used to there would be 3 EMS personnel on scene to handle these patients, now that will be 2. I hope the First Responders are ready to do some actual patient care instead of just standing around. I hope it all works out, and County Fire, I think yall would do a good job extricating, don't let it go to your heads though. I just wanted to let you know EMS is not mad about extrication, we work hard for our employees.

[Grady]

And be ready, Things work a lot differently when it is a paid department instead of volunteer, I won't even have to explain that one, you will find out for yourself. I do my jof for the patient. I don't do it for EMS Fire Police or the county. After going to school for 2 1/2 years I realize I made a mistake. I could of went to school for less time and been an RN, make 3x more money, had 20x more respect, work only 12 hour shifts, and not have to deal with all this drama. WE ARE NOT A LIFTING TAXI SERVICE we are trained prehospital emergency care provider who works under a DOCTORS LICENSE who has the ability to decompress your chest, needle cricothyroidotomy, intravenous access, intubate your trachea, cardiovert, pace your heart, defribrillate your quivering heart, IO access - needle right into your bone for giving meds, give any of 28 life saving drugs out of my drugbox, give CPAP to your drowning lungs, use a ventilator to breath for you until you get to the hospital, provide rapid or slow fluid resusitation if needed, activate trauma and cardiac alert systems at the hospitals and numerous other smaller interventions. The ability to stabilize patients so that I do no more harm. I could give a crap about - o man cool, I cut up a car. Like I said I do it for the patients and so should you. The next time we talk about EMT's and Paramedics, how about a little bit of respect for all that we do. In addition we must complete 48 hours of ceu's every 2 years and maintain 16 hour course work in ACLS, PALS, BTLS, NRP. AND EVERYONE WONDERS WHY GRADY EMS HAS PEOPLE QUITTING ALL THE TIME, FOR GOOD SAKES, WOULDN'T YOU WANT TO THINK THAT YOU DID ALL THAT WORK FOR A LITTLE APPRECIATION. All that for $10.50 / hour.

[Grady]

I would like to comment on this thread. I work at EMS and have an opinion about rescue. I have been to 8 GEMA extrication courses, 2 rescue specialist courses, and of course during EMT and Paramedic school we trained with vehicle extrication. My comment is not saying are we trained....By the way of course we are. Are you asking are there different people here who are more trained and familiar with our tools than others, of course. The same way that there are volunteers out there who are more trained than others. What happens is you will have someone show up on a scene and start grabbing things and want to go cutting and prying and saying all around their department, whether it be fire or ems, about how much better they did it than others could...blah blah. Let me tell everybody a story. On afternoon, cold windy and rainy, a bunch of teenage kids crossed over the yellow line passing a car on a curve on Hwy 111 South and hit an on-coming car head on. Now this is not recent by the way. This is years ago, you know back when fire and EMS got along. On this scene Three kids basically got crumpled in a small car. BEFORE any extrication could be attempted we had to gain access to the car so that steps could be performed to stabilized these patients. The reason why, imagine that there is a reason, is because on 14 year old teenager had a broken neck - and no, a fire fighter did not know this - because he did no patient assessment. Had this patient moved even an inch he would of been paralyzed from the neck down to this day. Cutting up a car is about more than taking it apart. Its about the patient or patients. I don't care who does it, but I will tell you this. Go on and go to cutting before these patients are stabilized and you will see rage. And no I don't mean by EMS, because shoot, who cares about EMS anyway. I'm talking about the emergency room doctor who will take this patient and wants to know all details about the scene so that he knows what the injury pattern is...By this way, this is the man or woman who can make your like miserable or happy. I'm talking about the trauma surgeon who will walk into that trauma room to prep for surgery and can tell how long that injury has been there, and yes that also means did it happen in the wreck, or due to improper handling? I'm talking about the lawyer who wants to know why. EMS and fire need to be a team. If you want to ask me a question about does EMS want to keep extricating?? The answer to that would be EMS doesn't give a crap about those stupid hurst tools that by the way are from the 1970's maybe yall should use those when you go to extricate instead of your shiny new ones that weigh only half of what those do. What EMS wants is to not lose 3 fulltime positions. Your response is going to be "Well we all have to make budget cuts"... Hummm... Try these pants on for size and lets see where the money would be wasted. EMS RUNS 250 - 300 CALLS PER MONTH ------

[Grady]

sorry it got posted twice, I don't know what happened

[Grady]

Also, What I would like for everyone to appreciate is the fact we don't just deal with these 911 calls. The transports that we do don't just come from Grady General. We get calls from the nursing home, assisted living, patients on hospice, and from Archobald who wants us to come pick up our county residents and take them to TMH, Shands, Augusta Burn Center, Atlanta, Macon and with the rescue person we already had 1 crew member to take the call and just had to get another in, those are the times we got county to cover rescue till they got back. If you are wondering about here recently, well I will be glad to tell you, since the county decided to consider for volunteers to take over rescue they have not allowed us to hire anymore personnel. We have 4 positions that fulltimers can no longer be put in to save money, so we have to call in our part timers who come from other countys and are not required to be here on time. And they leave early to make it to their full time job, DUE TO THE COUNTY WANTING TO SAVE THAT MONEY AND GIVE THEM TIME TO MAKE A DECISION. Know your facts about why the county had to be asked to cover rescue and NOPE YALL DIDN'T GET THERE QUICKER ON THOSE TIME -- GUESS WHAT CLETUS -- WE ACTUALLY BEAT YALL THEN, IMAGINE THAT, Guess it was because you were responding from your house. Get lost - Yep from time to time - but hey if you would of knew what you were talking about then maybe you would realize that because of all these part timers not knowing the county that is why. By the way, what is your level of education, do you farm, do you tow cars, come on now let me guess ---- You've probably been doing this since I was in diapers right?????

[Just Curious]

What if the EMS were privatized?
The commissioners would be taken out of the mix and professional management would take over.