The Last Thing You Lose Is Your Pride

"Who wants to start an IV?" I asked a couple of EMS students. The guys looked at each other with a smirk, they would rather be standing around doing nothing then doing their clinical hours.

I was a little surprised that they acted so unmotivated, surely they were not all experts in starting saline locks already.

The youngest guy in the group, who did not look older then 20 years old stepped forward, "I will do it."

The other guys whom appeared to be in their mid thirties looked at each other and laughed smugly, they did not like the idea of a young woman telling them what to do.

"So how old are you anyway?" all my patients asked me, they all seemed so astonished when I told them my true age, "you don't look older than 23," they would state.

No wonder people didn't take me seriously....

Kevin, was a motivated EMS student who as I could tell by looking at him, enjoyed starting IVs as much as I did.

There is just something about sticking someone with a sharp needle, directly accessing their veins that seemed like an artful skill to me.

Most people would call me sick.

Not the people who work in the ER, they all understand. "I don't want to torture you anymore" actually means, "I am going to get someone else to come and torture you for a little bit."

That is in the frequent cases where we get a patient who apparently has no veins anywhere that we can access. They are either too small, too fragile, too deep, or they roll to much, or in some cases the patient is a habitual IV drug abuser and all their veins are hardened into electrical wire. It is almost like they are harder then the needle.

Thank goodness not tonight. Kevin, the young EMS guy, had some really easy sticks. I was happy to give him the opportunity to practice.

I was not impressed with the laziness of the other students. Especially when I could have used some help later in the night.

An ambulance rolled in my room, a guy in shackles and chains, completely drunk screaming out obscenities and lashing out in violent spurts. I assessed the patient and started taking vital signs.

I looked out the door and three EMS students, the ones that have repeatedly refused to embrace the opportunities I presented to them stared in the room. They stared as I handled the drunk man by my skinny little self.

I wondered what their deal was, young Kevin wasn't around or else he would have been in the room bright eyed desperately seeking new experience. It is not that I didn't think I could handle the situation, I have dealt with worse situations in the ER, this was nothing.

I was surprised that these middle aged, EMS students were not actively engaging in such an opportunity to give medical treatment to the drunk and disorderly.

They walked away, all three able bodied students from the situation.

One person once told me, "the last thing you lose is your pride."

Think about it..