Grandfather weighing 30 stone 'died after falling off paramedics' stretcher'

[Sasha]

A drug addict is much different than a person with an MI or a diabetic on dialysis. A junkie's drug addiction isn't an medical condition beyond their control (to an extent)

People with MIs can lower their risk with proper diet and exercise... If the dialysis that is caused by diabetes caused by obesity can be preventable. There is such a thing as food addiction and mental disorders that lead to bingeing.. and drug addiction is a medical problem as well, often fueled by mental disorder just like overeating can be.

 

[redcrossemt]

People with MIs can lower their risk with proper diet and exercise... If the dialysis that is caused by diabetes caused by obesity can be preventable. There is such a thing as food addiction and mental disorders that lead to bingeing.. and drug addiction is a medical problem as well, often fueled by mental disorder just like overeating can be.

+1. Thank you.

 

[vquintessence]

There is a lot of unknown here.

Perhaps the ambo's were flustered by their obese pt presenting with ominous signs? I mean think of the situation as you responding to an obese male, with significant acute onset of difficulty breathing. What medical conditions come to mind, and what interventions will be required? Are any of those possibilities time sensitive? How long did the pt wait prior activating EMS? Would the EMS service allow a second unit to RESPOND to a lift assist?
IRREGARDLESS, I'll bet the end result will place a majority amount of negligence on the EMS providers for not remaining calm & collected while waiting for back-up. And a further bet would say the blame is justifiable.

If we look at the story in a different way... say.. how about the pt died on their stretcher while waiting for a lift assist to arrive. Wonder how the conversation would be then?

drug addiction is a medical problem as well, often fueled by mental disorder just like overeating can be

That's a stretch of the imagination.. but undoubtedly some piece of truth exists in the bowels of that statement.

 

[Onceamedic]

Perhaps the ambo's were flustered by their obese pt presenting with ominous signs?

On scene with 52 yof, stated weight of 400 lbs, chief complaint difficulty breathing. Home is a hovel, with actual holes in the floor. Patient has not left her bed in 4 months. Her bed is soaked in urine. Patient BP is 48/30 and she is in afib on the monitor. No prior cardiac history, no way to tell when onset of afib. Pt's body from the waist down is a mess of ulcers and excoriations.

We stabilized this patient and moved her to definitive care, all without dropping her and/or causing further harm. I don't care how "flustered" a medic is, there is NO excuse for dropping a patient.

 

[EMSLaw]

Would the EMS service allow a second unit to RESPOND to a lift assist?

They better. If not, I'm sure the fire department will come if you call. Heck, they'll come and rip walls out if that's what you need to move the patient. Like it or not, we're in a transport business, and getting the patient safely from Point A to Point B is a key part of what we do.

If we look at the story in a different way... say.. how about the pt died on their stretcher while waiting for a lift assist to arrive. Wonder how the conversation would be then?

Well, first of all, were that to happen, the patient would die in bed, because they should be waiting for the lift assist to even move him to the stretcher. And in that case, the blame would fall on the service that didn't send the right people and equipment.

Or it would simply be regrettable, but nothing anyone can help. In my area, two of the local services operate bariatric units. Neither generally operates 24-7, and if you need a bariatric unit at night they have to pull multiple rigs off the road to get two bariatric-trained EMTs. It can take an hour to get the specialized ambulance on scene. If the patient is having a heart attack, you either improvise, adapt, overcome.... or the patient doesn't get to the hospital and is DRT.

The bottom line here is either move the patient safely, or get more help. You should know how much you can handle. We all know that even a 250 lbs patient is heavy when its dead weight, and this patient was way more than that. The last thing we want to do is make the patient worse by dropping them.

 

[VentMedic]

And you definitely don't need 3 patients if the EMTs are injured in the lift when one is already too much to handle.

 

[atropine]

I truly envy the EMTs today with the high tech stretchers. I started in the profession with a stretcher that was one position which was about 8 inches off the ground. To get any patient off that stretcher we had to lift it to the level of the ED bed and the nurses sheeted the patient over. We had a great working relationship with FDs, privates and anyone else who cared to assist either at scene or in the ED.

However, physical fitness was emphasized back then so most of us had strong backs and legs. Given what we had to work with for equipment, commonsense had to be a necessity.

Yeah yeah, you probably had to feed the hoarses back then too, hey we have gasoline powered ambulances now days.

 

[VentMedic]

Yeah yeah, you probably had to feed the hoarses back then too, hey we have gasoline powered ambulances now days.

At least our firefighters weren't dying of heart attacks and strokes on scene back then. Look at the recent studies done with the Southern California FDs.

 

[Scott33]

On scene with 52 yof, stated weight of 400 lbs, chief complaint difficulty breathing. Home is a hovel, with actual holes in the floor. Patient has not left her bed in 4 months. Her bed is soaked in urine. Patient BP is 48/30

She wouldn't be pissing the bed for much longer with a MAP of 36.

 

[bunkie]

People with MIs can lower their risk with proper diet and exercise... If the dialysis that is caused by diabetes caused by obesity can be preventable. There is such a thing as food addiction and mental disorders that lead to bingeing.. and drug addiction is a medical problem as well, often fueled by mental disorder just like overeating can be.

+2, Just what I was going to say.

 

[kittaypie]

first of all, you really don't want to hear my opinion on ETOH emergencies (no sympathy at all for chronic users who do it to themselves). Will I get them to the hospital? absolutely. Will I treat them according to local protocols? absolutely. Will they get any sympathy at all? absolutely not. That doesn't mean they don't get treated.

part of patient treatment is treating them emotionally as well as physically.

 

[Onceamedic]

She wouldn't be pissing the bed for much longer with a MAP of 36.

Nope.. she was pretty darn sick... but she hadn't left her bed in months, so who knows when she did the pissing?

*** insert rant about enabler family members here **********