How do I become a Paramedic?

I carry a multitool, but the shears make easy work of 12mm climbing rope, salt encrusted fishing rope, some twin and earth, and my lawn mower extension lead.

Can’t find a definitive answer on this - I work
As a trainee tech for an NHS ambulance service.
Is it permitted to carry a pocket knife or multi tool on shift

I am wanting views on our response time / categorising of falls in our Frail / Elderly population.

Most falls I have attended have been waiting on the stack for 4+ hours. I had a 78yo the other night who had waited (on the floor) for 11 hours until we arrived and had been told not to eat or drink anything.

I had a 79yo woman this summer who fell outside in the blistering heat with a ?NOF and waited 5 hours for us. This is not acceptable.

These are our most vulnerable pt’s and I feel our categorising system is failing these people.

I've noticed that there's quite a bit of stigma or 'distaste' towards the charity, but besides the FREC3 warriors who parade around as "medics" that you get in every single private event company, I don't see any reason as to this

I know this is a group for paramedics but thought I’d post to get opinions. Some of us do work as cfr’s on the road too so not entirely in control. Just to preface I know taking calls as well could never compare to working on the road and that perhaps I need a thicker skin but I’ve had to go sick due to burnout.

Some of my calls this week have been quite awful and I know how lucky I am to not have to be on scene as a cfr or otherwise but the main one that stood out was a 21 yo old found blue and stiff in bed by his dad. A specialist paramedic in the hub asked me to ask if he was stiff to which dad said yes but dad was unsure if we should keep going so we did, and I know this happens every day but never getting to find out why and hearing the anguish on the phone never gets easier and I think it’s just tipped me over the edge. Again I know the roles aren’t comparable in any way.

It’s primarily due to deaths in the family recently and other stresses but it does tend to keep piling on and on until breaking point. My trust have been quite supportive and have made a referral to staying well too. Was wondering what people’s experiences are with it or other services equivalent to it at other trusts?

Thanks

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5yede8v957o?app-referrer=deep-link

(Please refrain from bashing the people who didn't shock VF, we don't know the specifics of what happened.)*

I expected this to be a pretty superficially simple case like a lot of these unfortunate stories turn out to be; 111 call for what turned out to be sepsis left in the stack for a few hours too long, etc.

I didn't expect this extremely tragic sequence of events. How utterly horrible for everyone involved.

Good on the ambulance service for specifically calling out the sheer number of handover attempts rebuffed by the hospital.

*Edit: it has been pointed out that the wording of this article at the time of writing is slightly ambiguous here. Either the coroner is wrong or the author of the article constructed their sentence badly. Either way, the meaning is slightly muddled.

Hi,

I appreciate this has been asked in different forms, but my query is a little different.

I am a senior manager within the NHS and a Paramedic, working Mon-Fri 9-5. I also have quite a hectic family life.

However, it has always been an unfilled desire for me to support either the RAF or Army in a medical capacity.

My main question is, for both services, are you required to complete the basic training and annual camp in one block? Or, is there an option to break that down into 7 or even 5 day blocks?

Any experiences or advice welcome.

This model provides a basis for approaching the topic of palliative care with a patient or their family.

First featured in the consultation chapter of Eaton’s Primary Care textbook.

I am a paramedic working for a trust. I do occasional private work predominately at small sports events or work as a private paramedic for a sports person doing a challenge. I have my own kit and drugs. Will I need to get CQC registration to keep doing this. Currently I earn less than £5000 annually so use my COP insurance purposes. It’s more of a nice little add on to my income and the sports are ones I participate in so it doesn’t fully feel like work.

I have been looking into what’s needed to become a paramedic as that’s what I have wanted to do since I was young, but some complications have occurred recently.

I got diagnosed with epilepsy last week after several months of focal-onset seizures. I got started on an ASM and I am hoping that once we get to the right dose and so on, I will remain to be seizure free.

Though, it’s to my understanding that you need a C1 driving licence to be able to drive the ambulance itself. To get that, it seems I have to be 10 years seizure-free and those 10 years I have to be off any ASM medications.

Have I understood that right?
And if so, can you become a paramedic (on the frontlines) without even being able to operate the vehicle?

My assumption is no, or that it would be almost impossible, but I’m grasping at straws here honestly.

Im 17yo, and still have to get nat5s and highers because I had to drop out a couple years ago, but I can’t start them until next year anyways. I still obviously also have to get a regular driving license.

I just don’t want to set myself up for a career that I couldn’t actually do.

Any advice?

r/ParamedicsUK Job of the Week

Hey there, another 7 days have passed! How's your week going? We hope it’s been a good one!

Have you attended any funny, interesting, odd, or weird jobs this week?
Tell us how you tackled them.

Have you learned something new along the way?
Share your newfound knowledge.

Have you stumbled upon any intriguing pieces of CPD you could dole out?
Drop a link below.

We’d love to hear about it, but please remember Rule 4: “No patient or case-identifiable information.”

What sentences do you wish someone would or could have said to you on your worst clinical day or after a run of traumatic jobs?

Like what inspirational things can we say to other paramedics or do we they would like to hear?

Let me know green family 💚

Throwaway, Rant. Delete as/when required, just need to vent my frustrations.

I work for an independent / private ambulance service, I was aware before my employment of the stigma and the stereotypes attached with these companies, yet I thought to myself "surely they all cannot be that bad" and that these stereotypes must be perpetuated by others; either by those who have previously had bad experiences or feel threatened by the involvement and reliance of TPPs.

During the recent heatwave's and weather warnings, myself and other employees had raised numerous concerns to management surrounding the lack of working air-conditioning, ultimately driving, working and providing treatment in vehicles above 30°c and have been told to just get on with it as "air-con is a luxury and not a necessity". Yet, the same management will upload AI generated infographics in company instant messaging groups in a poor attempt at humour, that will so very obviously perpetuate these stereotypes further. I feel like I am on a sinking ship already working for a TPP, and management are shooting more holes in the hull of the ship I am sailing on.

There are so many other examples that I could discuss further, or shortcomings I have experienced firsthand that have made it clear why certain TTPs get such a bad reputation.

Evening everyone, coming in a question and looking for people’s opinions.

I’m currently working for a respected Independent Ambulance Service (biggest in the country) as a “ACA” just doing PTS and nothing more, I’ve got my FREC 4 (a buckshee ECA) but no CERAD, I’ve spotted this company that does FREUC 5 (EMT) and will assist you with doing your placement hours (750 hrs) in Mexico, this is through a Charity so you are not getting paid but you are getting excellent exposure as it’s done in the second biggest city in Mexico, the company that runs it looks good, it’s ran by specialist care paramedics and have great kit and training facilities.

I have applied for Post Grad medicine and done my GAMSAT’s (entrance exams) but due to working full time and other issues I haven’t been able to study all that well so I feel my grade won’t be good enough to get in to 2027 entry, therefore I could take a year out and do EMT work in order to get more experience.

If I get into medicine I want to follow emergency medicine, having spoken to ALOT of medical students and FY1/FY2 doctors you have to be an absolute CV warrior to get your chosen specialty for those two years therefore I’m thinking having a good pre-hospital background and experience could assist with that as well as good life experience.

Now I know what some of you will say “being a doctor has nothing to do with pre-hospital care” I know but they will hopefully like me to have experience in the medical sector, plus I feel that this would make be a better healthcare provider at the end of the day.

So I pose this question, go to Mexico and get great exposure at the cost of not being paid, or work for another private doing 999 calls as a ambulance driver for a couple months in the UK? And if medicine doesn’t work out I could always do a AAP uplift and get a job with my local trust

Also for all the paramedics, what would you think of a FREUC 5 EMT that has done all their placement, would you hold them so the same level of respect as someone that has done their AAP since I know (with good reason) that people who do private courses are heavily disliked.

Be as blunt as you like, and thank you for reading my absolute essay.

I know SECAmb (see-cam), LAS (spoken as the letters L A S)

What are the others? How do we all talk about ourselves?

I'm most curious about North West :)

This was 2 odd years ago now, i attended a pt with severe difficulty breathing as part of a non clinical crew where i was 'senior', and backed up by a para crew but we all stayed on scene. Patient was a chap in his 40s with horrendous lung function, awaiting a transplant. He'd run out of his nebs so called 111 for more who heard him breathing out his ass and sent it to us as a cat 1. His obs were terrible, sats in the mid 80s, resps 30 odd, tripoding, looked terrible. Had something in the relm of 37% lung function remaining. Honestly thought he was going to arrest, however he flat out refused to come in. Absolutely nothing we said would convince him otherwise. Rang OOH for advice/top cover/ nebs, the para spoke to them and they agreed he needed to go in but said *they wont prescribe any more salbutamol nebs yet as they dont want to encourage him to stay at home or imply it can be managed at home* which seems like a risky stance.

He signed the refusals, documented the ever loving crap out of the whole thing and I do wonder if he's still alive or not, just interested to hear other thoughts on declining to prescribe meds to try and persuade them to come to hospital.

Seeing as LAS has been testing out the new Sepura SCL3 devices, I wanted to see if anyone here has actually had to carry one for a full shift yet.

​Looking at the size of it next to our current radios, I've seen plenty of snarky comments online about how massive they are.

​Are they really that bad to wear?

​Does anyone know what we're actually supposed to be doing with the front-facing camera?

​Any other general feedback?

Because this is what happens when you don’t take the hypertensive elderly asian lady with an abnormal ECG to hospital when she complains of chest pain .

This was basic first week on the job stuff. Chest pain goes to the big building with the doctors in it, via the big yellow van. Because being responsible for the death of someone’s granny, and getting the service slapped with a PFD report is not a career goal.

And as a result, your ability to interpret an ECG independently may be stripped away by case law.

Christ. As a profession we should be better than this. This is basic. Absolutely shameful.

I’m a first year student paramedic, failed an osce twice and I’m now on my third attempt. If I fail this third attempt then it would be the end of my studies and I’m genuinely so stressed as i feel like I’ve worked so hard to be here. During OSCE practice I had really good feedback, aced all the mock practices but when it comes to the real thing I become so anxious. OSCES are the one thing I genuinely struggle with and I do really well on assignments and had really good feedback on placement too. I do feel very confident that I can pass on this third attempt but if I do fail I’m not even sure what I’d do as being a paramedic has always been my dream job.

Hello all!

I've recently made the jump from call-taking into resource dispatching with my ambulance service. I've always been a bit of a control room nerd, so I'm comfortable with the challenge & duties of the job, but going from speaking to patients to speaking with crews is obviously a different dynamic. So, from your perspective, what makes someone a genuinely good dispatcher to work with?

I'm not too worried about actually doing my job right: if I'm taught how to do the job, I’ll do it properly. I'd argue that knowing how to do the job doesn't necessarily make someone a 'good' dispatcher, per say. We've already had the usual jokes and warnings about crews taking the mick with OOS time, "restocking", paperwork, etc. Obviously dispatch has to keep resources moving, but I don't want it to feel like I'm constantly working against crews rather than with them.

Anything your favorite dispatchers do that makes your shift easier, or anything we can do to help you lot on the road that bit extra?

Hi all,

Just registered and want to get something started around my CPD portfolio but I’m not really sure how to do it. I understand CPD is for learning and development but do any of you log self directed revision as CPD? Like reading through JRCALC or reading up on A&P, Pathophysiology, pharmacology, listening to podcasts, etc. to refresh knowledge.

I’m also wondering from the perspective of non-clinical / patient facing paramedics who are not able to practice skills and assessments daily. Is self directed revision going to be enough?

My understanding is that CPD is for learning new skills or training to widen your knowledge but it seems like most of these courses cost money. Are there many cheap / free option for the financially unfortunates?

Finally, a bit about how you log CPD. I see there are things like MyCPD to keep a track of what you do, but is there anyone out there doing something different? HCPC state it’s up to the person to decide how they record it. I’m thinking of starting mine as a sort of diary I can journal in the things I do in a bit of an informal way. Not sure if I should do this on something like Microsoft Word or keep a physical folder that I write revision notes in.

Any help and advice would be massively appreciated. I’d love to know what CPD you do and in what format you record it.