Tom Reynolds's Blog, page 10

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You may have noticed blogging being a bit light of late - due in part, I suspect, to SAD (again) and due in other parts to the ambulance service not getting any better.

I write about things here in the hopes that someone will read it, about the crap targets, the time-wasting calls, the poor state of our ambulances and all the other things that stop me from doing the job that I'd like to do.

So my blogging has me feeling a bit burnt out.

I need something to excite me, to interest me, to keep me p...

It's really simple - I hate forced overtime.I know that i...

It's really simple - I hate forced overtime.

I know that it's just part of my mental make up, but if I'm forced to stay longer in work than I'm contracted to be there I start to get itchy and fed up.

It can't be helped though - sometimes we just get that 'late job' which means that we are dealing with a patient after we should have clocked off. I'm somewhat more used to that, it is one of those things that just happens, and we get paid overtime to make up for it.

(I think it's flat rate...

I Know It's Not The Point, But...

£5.4 million pounds. For artwork to showcase 'British Culture'.

With £5.4 million pounds spent on the ambulance service I might not be left looking for a spare ambulance on my late starts.

We might have enough blankets for the coming winter.

I might have a fully kitted ambulance.

Looking wider - we might be able to look after our returning soldiers without needing charity.

We might be able to get some people out of poverty - thus saving lives.

Instead we'll have,

'LED panels on the roofs of bus...

Nuclear Bomb

Neenaw has written recently of 'banana man', in that post she mentioned someone dribbling on my arm...

There is a person on my patch who takes great pleasure in calling out an ambulance - I suspect that he likes the attention that he gets from us. The other night we were sent to him on four separate occasions.

For the first call he'd already left the scene, which was perhaps unsurprising as the call was over an hour old.

The second call was made from outside a pub - we rolled up and he wandered ...

I See My Name Mentioned...

...along with the lovely Scott Pack and the Friday project.

Amber

This is a post about how chasing government targets impacts directly on patient care.

I've often written about our chasing of our 'Cat A' targets - that we are tasked by the government to reach 75% of these calls within eight minutes. I've also written about how I think our senior management have put this priority above many others.

There is another target that we should be hitting - calls that are given 'Cat B' (serious but not immediately life threatening), we should be reaching these calls w...

Nothing

He has told me that he has taken a large overdose of tablets, that he wants to die.

He reclines on the ambulance trolley refusing to talk to me, of what he has taken we are not sure. We've done some detective work and from the empty packets it looks like it might be a lethal dose.

Luckily for him, this lethal dose can be treated in hospital.

I ask him why he wants to kill himself.

'I've got nothing', he tells me, 'nothing to live for'.

He's eighteen and already he thinks that his life isn't worth ...

Chicken And Egg

British book fanatics will soon be able to get their hands on Amazon's popular Kindle electronic book reader, after the company unveiled an international version of the gadget. In an announcement today, Amazon boss Jeff Bezos said the Kindle will be available worldwide on October 19, selling through the company's American website and shipping to the UK for $279 (£175) - although import duties will push the price up to around £200.

Although customers will have to order from the United...

NSFW

Dear prospective Conservative government.

Please fuck off you bunch of evil shitbags - all your expenses claiming, chauffeur-driven, second home owning membership should be ashamed of yourself.

Work longer, get paid less?

True, this doesn't compare to the plans of the past where you wanted to tattoo HIV positive people and put them in concentration camps but what sort of effect do you think this will have on the recruitment and retention of public sector workers?

Unlike you MPs us public...

Training (Part Two)

Yesterday I pointed out some of the things that I think the LAS are doing wrong with respect to the post-qualification training of ambulance crews.

Today I hope to be a lot more positive and provide some solutions.

The one solution that I'm not going to discuss is the need to provide many more formal, multi-day and single day, training courses as I think that goes largely without saying.

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The first problem is that we are still intent on chasing the pointless ORCON target, with too many...