Let’s dip our collective toes back in to the pool of memorable calls from my time with the good old FD. I enjoyed looking back in time for the last post, and it seems as though a couple of you did too and that’s all the encouragement I need.
The last post was about a memorable call, how about some memorable people this time? You know them, you love them, you all have them (if you work in this or an allied field), let’s hear it for frequent fliers!!! Here’s a couple, three that stick in my mind for various reasons.
Some of our frequent frequent flyers provided us (me) with lasting laughs. I still giggle about some of them to this day, when the recollections run through my brain. Lola would call us on occasion, for any number of minor ailments. But one of the first times I encountered her, during our initial course of treatment, one of the crew attempted to put a nasal cannula on her. These are used to deliver low-flow oxygen to a patient in need of a little boost in their oxygenation. As he approached her face with the cannula, Lola held up her hand to stop him, proclaiming, in no uncertain terms, “I’m allergic to oxygen!” This, of course, caused us all to pause so each one of us could, in our own way, stifle the laughter that was vigorously fighting its way to the surface. Now, do I think she meant to say she was allergic to latex? Possibly, since that’s a fairly common occurrence. However this call took place in the years before the switch from latex to nitrile exam gloves, so had that been the case it wouldn’t have mattered. I’m still not sure what Lola was allergic to. But I’m fairly confident in my medical opinion that it was not oxygen.
Sometimes, in the course of our dealings with frequent flyers, we would learn that a particular regular was more susceptible to the power of suggestion than others. Myra, for example. I remember the evening where most (emphasis on “most”) of our crew determined that Myra was near the top of this list. Even though I had been told about her behavior in advance, I’m pretty sure this was my first visit with Myra, but certainly not the last, although shift transfers came out soon after this encounter and I was granted a return to the high rise district, so my contact with her was (mercifully) short-lived. I don’t remember the specific complaint for which we were dispatched, but my partner that day was the report writer, so I was assuming a position in the background. Often times, the patient’s distress is readily apparent. On this night, Myra was in no apparent distress, so beyond taking her vital signs, which were all within normal limits, I wasn’t actively involved. But I was definitely listening in as my partner took her history. And it went something like this-
“Are you having trouble breathing?” “Yes.”
“Do you have a headache?” “Yes.”
“Does your stomach hurt?” “Yes.”
“Does your shoulder hurt?” “Yes.”
“Do you have leg pain?” “Yes.”
Since none of Myra’s answers jibed with what I (or anyone else paying the slightest bit of attention) was seeing, I spoke up at this point and suggested we stop asking Myra questions (since each question brought a new symptom), and instead just get her to the emergency department (since that was obviously her goal). My partner on this night chose instead-
“Are you having chest pains?” Which, of course, drew a “Yes.”
This, in turn, brought from me a glare at my partner followed by (in my best sotto voce) “What the fuck did I just say? Stop asking her questions. And it’s on you to explain to the hospital why we didn’t ALS a patient with chest pain.”
“I know, I know, I know.”
At this point Myra was loaded onto the cot, wheeled to the ambulance, and transported to the hospital for her complaints. We found out later that night she was discharged less than two hours later when the hospital could find nothing wrong with her either. Some of us came to believe that a good portion of our contact with Myra came at the urging of her husband. She didn’t always seem totally convinced of the existence of any particular ailment, yet, more often than not, her husband was sitting on the side, encouraging her to go to the hospital to get checked out. We noticed he never went to the emergency room with her. Instead, telling her he would be up to see her “in a couple hours” he would remain in their apartment as we rolled her off to the ambulance. Of course this was not the kind of thing that could be proven, but the sentiment was almost universal among the crews that dealt with Myra, that the husband, in need of a few hours of solitude, would suggest to Myra that she seemed to be having trouble breathing. Or whatever other complaint he could come up with to buy some “me” time.
Then there was the single-most foul mouthed patient I’ve ever encountered. Cynthia would hold a commanding lead in any scenario you can imagine that includes a large quantity of cursing. Cynthia would call us at all hours of the day or night, typically for very minor issues ranging from picking her up off the floor to more serious things like chest pain or trouble breathing. I’m convinced she had Tourette Syndrome due in large part to her creativity when it came to cursing. Most of the time her verbal venom wasn’t directed at any of us, rather it was more like cursing for the sake of cursing. And I’m not gonna lie, there’s something entertaining about seeing a woman that looks like one of our grandmothers cursing like the proverbial drunken sailor. As we would be headed out the door of her apartment, on the way to the hospital, it was not unusual to hear her exclaim to no one in particular “Grab my fucking teeth!” For another example, asking “Cynthia, what’s wrong today? Why did you call us?” brought the following reply – “My left titty hurts like a son of a bitch!” That was one of the milder exchanges we had with Cynthia. For the record her chest pain that day was not cardiac related. One of the methods we, as paramedics, employ to measure how much pain a patient is experiencing, is to ask them to rate their pain on a scale of 0-10 with 10 being “the worst pain you’ve ever felt.” Cynthia’s reply to this query one day was “Come a little bit closer so I can kick you in the scrotum, That’s how much I hurt, you asshole!” Often times we would have to “shush” Cynthia while we rolled her on the cot, either from her apartment to the ambulance or from the ambulance to her bed in the emergency department, as she would launch into a tirade that would make the late Sam Kinison blush. Again, usually directed at no one, but as loud as it was colorful.
I’m not gonna lie, at this point in time a lot of memories from the FD days are not as clear as they once were. But as I said up top, some, like these, are still crystal clear and can still evoke various feelings. In these cases, all smiles, if not outright laughter as I play through the images in my head.
I’m gonna wrap this one up for now, but before I go, today’s musical accompaniment has been a continuation from the last post – The Beatles. Abbey Road to be specific. I even stuck it out through Octopus’s Garden, a rarity for me, but I felt like the flow should stay true to the album for today.
Peace