Not An EMT...

Today was rather eventful - and very, very busy. This morning I learned a very valuable lesson - I am not EMT caliber. While in the ICU this morning, one of my patients went into respiratory distress. He's on a ventilator and his oxygen sats dropped to 75%. The physicians and I entered the patients room. I was horrified. The man has a trach in place, so the ventilator hooks to that instead of the endotracheal tube. He's been off sedation for roughly 2 days so, his eyes were open. His head was moving side to side rapidly, which indicated extreme distress to me. His eyes were wide open with a pleading look. His respiratory rate was 35-40, with no improvement in his sats. I found my heart beating extremely fast and I started to hyperventilate a little. The physician increased the man's ventilator support and gave him some nebs. Over a course of about 5 minutes (which seemed like an eternity to me), his sats came up to mid-90s and his respiratory rate dropped to the low 20s. At this point, I glanced around the room and found the pictures his granddaughter drew him. I became a little emotional. I felt tears welling in my eyes. I backed up against the wall and tried to compose myself. I slowed my breathing and blinked back the tears. It was a little overwhelming. I don't think I am EMT material...being as they'd probably have to transport me via ambulance from the scene. I'm sure that would go over well. HA!

On a more positive note, I did ace my BCLS recertification today. It took me all of 5 minutes to take the written test - which I scored a 100% on. :) Fortunately for me, there wasn't a "must keep composure" section to the test. Otherwise I would've flat out flunked it.