The Fire Guys :: Radiocast
For those of you already on Firehouse.com, you probably already know about these guys. For those of you who aren't on there... You gotta tune in to these guys.
The have a free radiocast on the net that you can tune into, even if you don't want to download anything.
These guys talk about the latest news and events and concerns in the fire department world. I have been listening to them for a little while now, and I really like the way they put ideas and thoughts out there in a way that is very unbiased and sometimes fun. Check em' out here:
http://www.radiofirehouse.com/broadcast/category/the-fire-guys/
- Justin
Help save a life…
Sunday 8-7-2005
9:55pm… We are dispatched to a man down, and unconscious in front of a restaurant.
Let me just throw this out there as well; Just a few minutes prior to this call, our ambulance was dispatched to another call outside of our fire district, and they ended up transporting to our local trauma hospital (approx. 25mins away). To make it even more interesting there isn’t another ambulance within 35mins of where we are responding.
Anyway, when we get on scene we find an unconscious man, approximately 35 years old, on his back bleeding from his mouth and right eye. We talked with a witness who said the man walked form the restaurant and tripped over a parking cement block. He said the man landed on his face, rolled over, and became unconscious. He also told us that the man had been drinking but said he didn’t drink enough to intoxicate him.
We immediately felt that this type of fall was worthy of full C-Spine precautions (c-collar, backboard… everything). After securing him, we inserted an oral airway (a small plastic piece used to keep the tongue from blocking the airway) so we could ventilate.
I was put in charge of ventilation. I was told to keep time with his breathing; this wasn’t too hard since he was making small gasps for air which made it easy to judge when to give him ventilations. I continued ventilations for the next 10mins until he completely stopped breathing all together. We then started CPR, and got him back to small gasps fairly quickly. I then resumed ventilations.
Finally, 20mins later the ambulance arrived. 20mins felt like a lifetime.
When we were loading him onto the gurney and into the ambulance he had opened his eyes and was starting to become conscious again.
After all was said and done, it felt great. What a call.
After we returned to the station I started thinking that this was my first time really saving a life. It didn’t seem like much at the time but overall it took awesome team work from the whole crew, and I feel proud that I played my part in keeping that man alive.
Night of compound fractures…
Sunday, August 7th 2005
It had been slow most of the morning and early afternoon. We were finishing up some training when the first call of the day came.
We were dispatched to an approximately 50 year old male with a compound fracture of his lower leg (For those of you who don’t have medical background a compound fracture is when the bone comes through the skin.). When we arrived at the scene we found the man on the ground under his pear tree, with a mangled ladder at his side.
When we pulled back his pant leg it revealed a serious compound fracture to both his fibula and tibia. Both bones were completely severed and had punctured this skin in two different locations. He still had function and feeling of his foot and toes and there was no serious bleeding. This is very lucky for this type of injury.
After returning from the previous call it got quiet once again until about 8pm. We then relieved another dispatch for a second compound ankle fracture.
When we arrived we found an approximately 60 year old woman with a less serious compound fracture of her tibia. There were no signs of a major fall, but from further questioning we were able to determine that this injury was due to a previous injury she had earlier in the week, when she had a small hairline fracture but never went to the doctor to get it taken care of.
After limping around on this injury for a week, the fracture finally gave way when she was going downstairs, and completely separated and punctured through the skin.
What a night!
Overall these were some pretty intense calls. Not as bad as say the car accident or anything but none the less, I got a lot of good practice in this area.
