More Blood, More Sweat and Another Cup of Tea

I told him that I’d be more than happy to point him in the direction of where my thoughts lay.

The brand-new Zafira was parked in the garage at Newham so I hopped behind the wheel and, after some struggling with the new design of handbrake, managed to reverse it out and into the parking area.

Where to the absolute horror of the station officer I drove into another car.

Oops.

Luckily there was no damage to the Zafira (which had less than 600 miles on the clock) and very slight, if any, damage to the other car.

The first accident I had in over 18 months and it was in front of a station officer…

Not a good start to the shift.

My thoughts on the Zafira are these; if you wanted a rapid response vehicle, the Zafira shouldn’t have been chosen. It is too top heavy and wallows like a hippo in thick mud. The acceleration is awful, you hit the pedal and it takes one and a half seconds before the diesel engine gives you any sort of power. It is comfortable to pootle around town in, and the high-up viewing position is quite nice.

But there is no way that it could be considered a ‘Fast’ car.

I think the reason why we have them is because they are able to carry patients, and I imagine that soon FRU drivers will be asked to take the coughs and colds that we see so much of to hospital.

NYE Night (#ulink_2ea4fc7c-1e33-5dbf-963a-d2dc4ff3c316)

New Year’s night was a busy one for the London Ambulance Service. There were 38 stabbings over the course of the night. I spoke to my workmate who was on the FRU that night; he attended four stabbings one after another.

By 5 a.m. there had been in excess of 2000 calls (we normally do a shade under 4000 calls over 24 hours).

On the television one of our top-ranking management people described the night as ‘horrific’, which I would say is a pretty fair assessment.

I am extremely glad I wasn’t working that shift.

Ten Deep Breaths (#ulink_46e6b6d0-4402-5b60-9935-31e9f61cebe4)

The call details appeared on the computer terminal in the FRU:

‘Nineteen-year-old male—Patient has lump on ribs—difficulty in breathing.’

Halfway to the address, a private house, my screen was updated:

‘Patient has taken cocaine.’

I was met at the front door by a young male, stripped to the waist and obviously agitated.

‘Comein, myribsfeelfunny, andmyshoulderbladedon’tfeelright.’

‘Slow down,’ I said, taking his pulse—110, a bit on the high side, but he was bouncing off the walls.

‘My ribs man! They don’t feel right! Have a feel.’ He then started running his hands up and down his chest.

‘Have you fallen over? Been hit? Anything unusual happened?’ I asked.

‘No man—just feel them…FEEL THEM!’

‘Look, you need to calm down,’ I replied. ‘I can’t do anything while you are hopping all over the place.’

He started shouting, ‘FEEL THEM! JUST FUCKIN’ FEEL THEM!’

He turned his back to me, indicating that I should feel his normal-looking ribs.

A sudden wave of anger passed over me—it was all I could do to not punch him in the back. I examined his ribs; they felt perfectly normal to me.

‘There,’ I said, ‘your ribs are fine.’

‘What about my shoulder blades man?’

‘Look, you’ve taken cocaine right? You are feeling paranoid, it’s normal, just try to relax a little.’

‘WHAT…ABOUT…MY…FUCKIN’…SHOULDER BLADES!’

He turned his back on me again. I gritted my teeth and grabbed his shoulder blades. ‘They are fine. Now. Sit. Down.’

He sat down. Then he stood up, then he paced around the kitchen, then he did a few circuits of the sofa, then he sat down again, then he stood up and hopped around a bit. I was getting tired just watching him.

‘Look,’ I said trying to calm him, and me, down, ‘is this the first time you’ve taken cocaine?’

‘No man!’

‘OK, well if you want we can take you to the hospital, get you checked out if you’d like?’

‘NO!’ he shouted. ‘I’m not going to hospital.’

Fine, I thought, not that the hospital will thank me.

‘OK mate, then are you alone in the house?’

‘Nah, my dad’s asleep upstairs.’

‘Well, I’d like to have a chat with him, so he can keep an eye on you.’

‘NO! Get out of my house.’ He started advancing towards me. ‘No hospital, no waking my dad up, just get the fuck out of my house!’

I left the house. While a fight with the patient would have done absolute wonders for my stress levels, it certainly wasn’t worth the hassle, the risk of injury and, most importantly, the paperwork.

But what should I do now? If a patient isn’t transported then we should leave a copy of our patient report form with them. Should I post it through the letterbox? The problem with that was if his father saw the report I’d be breaching patient confidentiality. I guessed that the police wouldn’t be too interested in paying him a visit either. So I left the form sitting in my car—there was little else I could do for him, as he didn’t want help.

I sat in my car, filled out my forms and took a couple of deep breaths. It would be a long Christmas…

Taxi? (#ulink_03c71ebb-32d0-57a7-9646-556c8b85c368)

I’ve had a couple of people send me a story that appeared in the newspapers.