Getting Back To It

While I still think about the events I blogged about last, I am back in action and coming to terms with what happened.


There is light at the end of the medic class tunnel.

The requirements for the program I am in include clinical hours in various hospital departments and ride time on an ambulance that isn’t your home agencies’. The clinical hours, perhaps obviously, are time-based, and I only have 12 hours of those left (8 with a pediatrician and 4 at our 911 center). Ride time, on the other hand, is considerably more amorphous in terms of how it is measured. There are four phases of the ride time component (orientation, BLS skills, ALS assist and ALS from start-to-finish), and completion of each stage is solely determined by a “preceptor”. In theory, it could take a few hours or hundreds. This has made me nervous as there is no “I’m half way” or “almost there”. Until now, that is.

My preceptor told me last night that he feels he can sign me off after two more outings (I had thought we’d need MANY more). His confidence in me is greater than my own, but it helps to know he thinks I’m ready. He’s a professional paramedic, but also the chief of his hometown fire/rescue/ambulance, so he knows what I’ll be up against when I’m turned loose. Most of the medics in my class will ride with a paid agency and won’t be asked to handle a call on their own until quite a while after they’ve gotten their card. I, on the other hand, will be the sole ALS provider on MANY calls starting from the day I get my card. My preceptor knows all of this so his willingness to sign me off makes me proud and scared at the same time.

The end is in sight, which, oddly enough, means a new beginning is right around the corner.

DJ