Urban Shield

I got back home around 0615 this morning from being at a medical post all night since 1700 the night before. It was quite a slow night compared to my usual workload at the ER; I really do wish the SWAT guys were less careful than they are now. I guess that means all the teams are improving and making much fewer mistakes than last year. I did get to meet the French National RAID team, all of them were extremely nice and shook everyones hands and kept thanking us for the invite. My partner for the night- Matt Rossi, was a wilderness first responder from San Mateo County Sheriff's office. He had quite a few funny stories and was super nice and easy to get along with unlike some other people I have had to be partnered up with at medical events. Very down to earth mellow guy who didn't play the "this is my territory since we in San Mateo and I am boss" card. He actually wanted to leave me in charge and I told him I'd pass cause I hate being boss in a foreign place, but if there was something big medically, sure I'd take over the situation I guess. I taught him some more advanced wilderness techniques which he found quite cool and I think he's probably going to share it at his next SAR meeting. My family didn't help my fatigue by waking me up at 0900 giving me a total possible 3 hours of sleep and a large migraine for the rest of the day.

Here's some pictures for your enjoyment:

Update

I greatly enjoy season 3 of The Academy, a Fox Reality show. The first 2 seasons were following a law enforcement academy, but this season it is a fire academy from Orange County, CA. It is a much better insight into the life of a firefighter/EMS worker than all the other medical trash that has been developing e.g. NBC's Trauma, Mercy, Three Rivers, etc. There are so many errors in medical dramas that it isn't even watchable. Ever see a paramedic use a laryngoscope to put an OPA in? HECK NO!

I still think the best EMS drama/documentary is Discovery Health's Trauma: Life in the ER. I mean it is all documentary; EMS and the ER is full of drama already, it actually doesn't need any "fakeness" added to make it awesomely interesting. My $0.02.

On another note, my sister almost killed her patient yesterday. She was suctioning a trach tube to clear it of secretions and buildup and she had the yankauer tip in longer than necessary eliminating the pt's oxygen source. It's alright, mistakes made now won't be made later when it matters.

Mom's CEA is down to 17 now from 400's and her CT scan showed a 15% reduction in tumor size. All good news, but the tumor reduction seems slight compared to her bloodwork so there is some discrepancy. PET scan in 2 months will give us a better understanding of what the heck is going on. At Kaiser today, there was a new medical assistant learning and didn't know how to use the machine to take vitals; did not know how to use the pulse ox and BP cuff. Honestly if you don't know how to do something ask! Don't make stuff up.

She said "oh that's your BP" to my mom and my mom told her that was the patient before and that she hasn't even felt the cuff inflate yet (the MA didn't know where the inflate button was... heaven forbid she had to do a manual BP).

Articles

I love Medscape!

For any medical buffs out there that have not signed up for it, you should really consider doing so. I love the CME articles and really enjoy diagnosing the problem presented and usually the articles come with awesome pictures. Just finished an article on lower abdominal pain in a 30 y.o woman- she apparently has a tuboovarian abscess.

Next up: Recurrent GI Bleed in a 64 y.o woman.

On another note... a pretty big earthquake was felt today (only a 3.3, but it felt much bigger) probably due to the S-waves.

Nota bene that tomorrow is a California state-wide earthquake drill known as the Great Shakeout.

=]

*Edit/Update*

2150: I love it how at the end of the article the GI bleed in a woman becomes a man, because apparently after discharge "his hemoglobin was stable". hahahaa

*Burp*

I am so full right now.

I skipped breakfast and lunch today cause of training, but when I got home around 1600 I ate one Costco hotdog, a whole leftover fish, rice, and veggie dish from Coco's, 10 pieces of sushi, and downed a 64 oz. soda.

Yup... it's official. I'm a fatty. =D

Git 'R Done

So we did the most difficult painting portion today.

Foyer = done!

Freaking paint tried to tag me in the eye, but I moved out of the way with panther like speeds. Hah! Take that paint and Newton!

Earlier in the morning I sent out the second portion of my deposit to make me smarter. Yay for edumakation.

Tomorrow I got training with the county's Medical Reserve Corps aka MVDR. We are going to play with the trailers and cabana so I will be proficient at making a mobile hospital during big bad situations. Too bad my fellow teammates don't realize I'm going to hum the theme song to MASH the whole time.... hahahaa

Afterwards I plan to hit up Borders to use that lovely 40% coupon. I love bookstores and can spend hours in them. I get so giddy opening up good medical references and looking at what kind of silly grown ups still read in the manga section. Of course occasionally I do browse prior said section, but only occasionally =P

Call me Picasso

Yeah right....

Mr. Picasso never painted with just white! Our dirty, crayon crusted, feet-marked walls are being painted glossy white and it makes the rooms so much brighter with the same lighting. I plan to do the majority of the house except for the bedrooms; so far I finished the dining area today. =D

At least Picasso never cut off his earlobe and gave it to a prostitute and then later on commit suicide by shooting himself in the chest.....

Winner Winner... Chicken Dinner!

Holy MOLY!!!

I am super lucky of some sorts because today I got an email from Nonin Medical saying I was a winner of the Nonin Challenge. You submit a small essay on how Nonin fingertip pulse oximeter has affected you or your experiences with it and each month they select a submission and give the person a free Nonin Onyx II 9550 pulse oximeter! WOOHOOOO

Valued at $350.00 and I got it for FREE. The pulse ox is so amazing though if you have ever used one; there will always be imitators and duplicators. It took kind of long for them to respond though and I though I lost or something cause it has been months since I wrote it....

Rock N Roll

More like ska and reggae 1/2 marathon! For the majority of the day I heard music genres other than Rock and Roll; I am not a music major, but I'm pretty sure of my observation.

Our medical station was really, really, REALLY slow throughout the early portion of the day, but when the runners finally started to come in it was crazy! We'd be popping a blister or icing a wound and there would already be 3 other people in line. Our team was also one of the largest teams for any of the medical stations, but it still felt like we were shorthanded.

Our group had:

3rd year residents x 2 (i call them captain and co-captain)

1 PharmD

2 RN's

1 Paramedic

1 Wilderness EMT/ER Tech (me)

3 RN's in training

bunch of high school students

They called me blister dude cause apparently my experience from search and rescue, Urban Shield SWAT exercise, and Boy Scouts made me the super expert. Also, all of my fellow teammates need to do more patient teaching. I saw way too much doing and not enough explaining, which isn't just bad medicine but also dangerous. We were putting ice on lots of people, but not telling them how long, when to remove, frostbite precautions, etc. All in all good job by all though.

I gots me a free t-shirt =D

Old School

Today I went to Carl's Jr to buy a burger and saw one of my old English teachers chilling with some friends at the restaurant. I didn't say anything, but I definitely recognized him as Mr. Oppenheimer; I think the main reason I remember him is cause of his "Santa Clause" type features not to mention his son was also our year at Leland High.

Wow it's been a while and he hasn't changed one bit.... looks exactly the same.

Locked Out

I was so bored today cause there was no one home, I decided to go on a stroll in my neighborhood. I took my D90 along to hopefully capture these two turkeys that seem to always be in our area, but they keep eluding me- sneaky sneaky!

I ended up seeing a thong hung on a wire fence less than a minute into my walk. I guess a neighbor of mine decided she would like to go commando... the funny thing is the area where the fence is located is covered in poison oak. I wonder if she is now itchy in her special place?

When I got home I realized I forgot to take my set of keys and had to chill outside waiting till my parents got home from their shopping run.

I miss my sizzle sizzle Lovely Lady and Normie.