EMS Blog
Nelson House Manitoba July 2007
Churchill Manitoba June 27th - July 3rd 07
Cross Lake Manitoba May 31st - June 16th 07
When God Made Paramedics…
Anonymous
When the Lord made Paramedics, he was into his sixth day of overtime when an angel appeared and said, “You’re doing a lot of fiddling around on this one.”
And the Lord said, “Have you read the specs on this order? A Paramedic has to be able to carry an injured person up a wet, grassy hill in the dark, dodge stray bullets to reach a dying child unarmed, enter homes the health inspector wouldn’t touch, and not wrinkle his uniform.”
“He has to be able to lift three times his own weight, crawl into wrecked cars with barely enough room to move, and console a grieving mother as he is doing CPR on a baby he knows will never breath again.”
“He has to be in top mental condition at all times, running on no sleep, black coffee, and half-eaten meals. And he has to have six pairs of hands.”
The angel shook her head slowly and said “Six pairs of hands…no way.”
“It’s not the hands that are causing me problems, said the Lord, “It’s the three pairs of eyes a medic has to have.”
“That’s on the standard model?” asked the angel.
The Lord nodded. “One pair that sees open sores as he is drawing blood and asks the patient if they may be HIV positive.” (When he already knows and wishes he’d taken that accounting job.)
“Another pair here in the side of his head for his partner’s safety. And another pair of eyes her in front that can look reassuringly as a victim and say, “You’ll be alright ma’am, when he knows it isn’t so.”
“Lord,” said the angel, touching his sleeve, “rest and work on this tomorrow.”
“I can’t,” said the Lord, “I already have a model that can talk a 250 pound drunk out from behind a steering wheel without incident and feed a family of five on a public service paycheque.”
The angel circled the model of the Paramedic very slowly, “Can it think?” she asked.
“You bet”, said the Lord, “It can tell you the symptoms of 100 illnesses, recite drug calculations in its sleep, intubate, defibrillate, medicate, and continue CPR non-stop over terrain that any doctor would fear...and still keep its sense of humour. This medic also has phenomenal personal control. He can deal with a multi-victim trauma, coax a frightened elderly person to unlock their door, comfort a murder victim’s family, and then read in the daily paper how Paramedics were unable to locate a house quickly enough, allowing the person to die. A house, which had no street sign, no house numbers, no phone to call back.”
Finally, the angel bent over and ran her fingers across the cheek of the Paramedic. “There’s a leak,” she pronounced. “I told you that you were trying to put too much into this model.”
“That’s not a leak,” said the Lord, “it’s a tear.”
“What’s the tear for?” asked the angel.
“It’s for bottled-up emotions, for patients they’ve tried in vain to save, for commitment to that hope that they will make a difference in a person’s chance to survive, for like.”
“You’re a genius,” said the angel.
The Lord looked somber. “I didn’t put it there.” He said.
When God made Paramedics Word Doc