I was Green Mobile (ready for a job) in the Red 1 Only period of my night shift. This means it’s the last fifteen minutes before the end of shift (in the unlikely event you didn’t get a break) and to give you a fighting chance of getting off on time you can only be given the calls that are almost guaranteed “not breathing” or “cardiac arrest”. We call it the Red 1 Roulette.
Sadly, I didn’t win this time . . . Continue reading
I was sat in my FRU on standby outside one of London’s larger train stations. It was a busy Monday morning and hundreds, if not thousands of people were going about their day, rushing to get here and there.
What a random LAS FRU looks like
I’d managed to be here for over five minutes! Without getting a job down on the MDT!! Miracle!!! But then, TAP TAP TAP at my passenger side window. Looking up I saw a well suited middle aged man looking in and trying to grab my attention – uh oh, what could it be . . . ? Someone injured? Heart attack? One under? The possibilities were endless.
I wound down the window and smiled . . . Continue reading
We were on our way to Bossleworth House*. A 26 year old female, head pain and feeling faint. Now, where had I heard that name before. Bossleworth House, hmmm . . . oh yes, Bossleworth House! The set of flats that were right beside the A&E department of the Hospital.
No sooner had we arrived and stepped out of our truck than our patient emerged from the set of flats. As patients go who call 999 for an emergency ambulance, this one was well presented, well dressed, well manicured and just putting away some blusher into her handbag as she approached . . . Continue reading
“I’m gonna do it! I will! You ain’t stopping me!”
“I’ve not doubt you will David*. But can we at least just talk about it first hey?”
I took another step toward my patient but he turned and ran off down the road. I watched helpless, as David would occasionally attempt to step into the paths of oncoming cars. Thankfully, his cumbersome actions were so ridiculously obvious to the motorists they simply slowed down and carefully maneuvered around and continued on their way, only a small portion of bemusement added to their night.
My patient quickly disappeared out of view leaving me standing perplexed and alone. Continue reading
Most of the time, stabbings turn out to be ridiculously trivial affairs involving handbags at dawn in some form or another. But none the less, you still try and get to them quick . . . just in case it might be something real for once.
My car screeched* to a halt outside a busy intersection and I was instantly greeted by an unusually dressed Shoreditch trendie looking rather flushed. He gestured, over theatrically I thought, toward a young man propped up against a lamp post clutching at the side of his chest in pain.
“Quick! He’s over there! He says he’s been stabbed!” Continue reading
A hoarders paradise. This was the best way to describe the home we were currently in. Stacks and stacks of old magazines, newspapers, books, leaflets, letters, bills – as well as boxes, plates, tins, brushes and all other odds and ends that you could possibly collect and stack precariously on top of one and other over an inveterate period of time.
The moment you attempted to scoop aside any volume of material to make way for room then a landslide of other debris took its place. A small Victorian walnut coffee table was lifted in a vein effort of creating a few inches of space only to cause an avalanche of paperwork and books, some of which, including D.H. Lawrence’s ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’ collapsed onto our patients face . . . who lay crumpled in a heap, currently in cardiac arrest . . . Continue reading