Lost in translation

Day 1 of my ambulance practicum. I have an amazing preceptor, I'm happy to report. That was, without doubt, one of the greatest contributors to the anxiety that was building over the past month. He's simply amazing. Not in a puppy dog love way, but in a feeling of confidence in his skill and knowledge level.

There were only 3 calls, which is quite quiet for this station (it's the hood). I took it upon myself to run the third call, which went all right. Nothing to write home about (or even discuss).

What was worthy of attention and thought was call 2. We were dispatched to a woman who had fallen down the stairs. As we arrived, I held c-spine. The lady had 2 children - an 11 month old and a 4 year old. My preceptor's partner held the 11 month old because they were crawling around. The lady was Spanish and spoke English well, but with an accent.

Fire showed up, we boarded her and got her into the ambulance. Her husband came shortly thereafter and was going to follow behind as soon as he rationalised the children.

We were en route to the hospital when my preceptor and I were asking detailed questions. It turns out that this lady was taking her 11 month old downstairs to breast feed when ***THEY*** fell down the stairs.

Holy crap. Let me tell you I have never seen an ambulance parked on the side of the road (for something other than a car accident), but there we parked, calling the husband, creating a rendezvous point to do an assessment on the infant.

The lady said she had told dispatch that she was holding her infant when she fell, but there was some sort of loss in the translation to the information we received.

Lesson for the day: never believe dispatch and be a detective.