Monday, November 01, 2004

Night Shifts

Well there we go, I have managed to survive another set of busy nights..... When I arrived on Friday evening I expected to be busy for the full night, since it was the first Friday after payday.......... but to my surprise the volume of work did not match my expectations. By the end of my 12 hrs we had treated 6 patients in total, nothing too taxing for my skills either.

Saturday was however a completely different story. Arrived as usual at 1830hrs (6:30pm) and put the kettle on whilst chatting to colleagues about their day, the vehicle I was taking over was just pulling into the carpark so I knew that I would get a good chance to check it over before starting my shift. 1845hrs I put my bag into the vehicle and started to check the vehicle, this means ensuring that there is sufficient equipment on the vehicle and that all this is in good working order. I had just completed checking the Defib and was about to check the response bag when the phone went and my partner for the evening shouted out the mess room door that we had a 999 call, so there we were 1854hrs and already winging our way through the streets with lights and sirens going and this was how it was going to be for the rest of the shift.

When we cleared from this call, we were returned to base to finish checking our vehicle, whilst we were in the A&E department the staff advised us that they were having a dooking competition and that we were invited to join in later in the shift if we were not too busy......HA HA HA

I had promised to supply the chocolate for the A&E nursing staff (I have never seen anyone smile so much when given a box of maltesers) to cheer them up as they were looking stressed the night before.

We eventually managed to get our break at 2345hrs (second time around after being disturbed for a male who when my colleague (a very pleasant female paramedic) spoke to him told her to "F**k off" so we did.....we are not there to be abused!

After our 13th call of the evening (and it was only 0345hrs) we managed to get another break and recieved our next call to transfer a male who was out with a friend whilst here on holiday and was jumped and punched (sustained a # mandible whilst trying to protect his friend) to a maxillo facial specialist nearer to his home address. This was our last call of the evening and we were glad to see our colleagues sitting on the station at 0640hrs when we returned.

Guess what I am working next weekend?????? YES NIGHT SHIFT Again :)

No comments: