Saturday, July 07, 2007

Babies and Social Work

So our EMS family got an addition last night. A Baby Girl. Pretty Little thing, (5lbs 9oz) with a pretty name of a southern belle, Grace. Now most day old newborns, I must say are pretty funny looking, all wrinkled and weird shaped heads. But Grace..Little Grace is beautiful. She had a whole paparazzi waiting on her. Kid's gonna have to get used to flash bulbs, being that this paramedic "aunt" is a photographer in her other life.

Today was Social Worker day. I was more of that than a Medic today. No life saving, just getting the gears in motion so that my patients today could get the help they so desperatly need. Terminal Cancer patients shouldn't have to spend the last few months on earth in dirty squalor. Geriatric couples should live out the rest of thier days not having to worry about what to do when they fall down and can't help each other get up because they live alone. So I played Social Worker today. It's time consuming, spending all shift on the phone with the people who help us take care of these particular type of problems.

But, I'm laerning my place in my new role. And these types of calls are some of the most difficult. I can fix Congestive Heart Failure, I can take pain away using Morphine, but these people need more than a paramedic. But we are the ones that start the ball rolling.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Congrats on the new baby!

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Anonymous said...

Your point is well-made. I am unaware of a social work protocol for any EMS agency. Furthermore, I am unaware of any component of our education which trains us to be the gatekeepers for folks who need social services but don't know where to begin. I too have had many opportunities to introduce those in need to the proper agencies. Here in a small town it's relatively easy as I personally know all the key players.
Keep up the good work. There's not going to be anything extra in the paycheck for it but it's what real professionals do.

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