I had a post

I had a post, about the dichotomy of 2 patients who seemed similar enough to each other on the surface, and how different their home lives were. But it's late, and I need to go to bed.

I have a blister on my hand, just inside the webbing between my thumb and index finger. You know, the place that gets all the pressure when you grab things. Yeah. It sucks.

Today was, thankfully, a light day, in terms of calls. One round trip (which technically is two calls, since you have to do the paperwork for the return trip) at 1300, and then one at 1700.

Unfortunately, the 1700 call was for a bariatric patient. Evidently, he wasn't bariatric enough to require the special unit, so all we needed was the wider stretcher. So we pick up the stretcher, run some errands, and head to the hospital.

Except the genius on dispatch at that time gave us the wrong room number...a number that doesn't exist in the hospital. Add 30 minutes to drive to a different building thinking it's there, and then back to the main building with the correct room number.

Anyway, we needed some extra hands on this one. Dood was 375lbs. Add the 50-60lbs of the wider stretcher in there, and you have me and my partner attempting to deadlift about 215lbs each. I think my max deadlift (one rep, max weight) is about 150lbs. I'm no slouch. But when I tried to pick up my end of the stretcher today, I didn't move it. I don't mean it moved, but I couldn't lift it to drop the wheels down either. I mean it was like a cartoon when the character strains and strains but doesn't move the boulder kind of thing.

But seriously...Dispatch really needs to arm us with the correct info. I mean, come on...this kind of weight is break-your-back-and-go-on-disability-forever kind of stuff. My partner, who is pretty damned strong and can lift a lot of weight, had issues lifting the back end to get the patient in the ambulance. And that was with part of the weight supported by the truck!