> and this brings us round nicely to the fact that paramedic training needs
to be beefed up considerably. [Robbie]
Exactly, as an experienced CCU nurse has already been through years of
general nurse training before specialising for several further years,
including various ENB courses, and despite that, as Martyn suggests, many
still have difficulty with autonomy, especially with the more subtle and
riskier decisions. Of course, nursing is steeped in anachronisms, so it's
hard for nurses to - on the one hand - become autonomous in certain areas of
practice, while they're still checking drugs with each other in another area
of practice. And I don't believe ambulance technician training is remotely
comparable to RGN training, while paramedic training is measured in weeks I
believe, as opposed to years.
Still, I can foresee the advantages in rural environments as recently
posted, but these areas are likely to have the benefit of good telemedicine
infrastructure already in place to support paramedics' decision making, and
with those long journey times, you can easily rationalise the benefits of
this sort of system. Notwithstanding the impressive newspaper article, it
does give the distinct impression of a "once in a blue moon" dramatic sort
of case and, rather like the HEMS thoracotomy-on-the-pub-floor case a few
years ago, the media, the public, and so the politicians will just love it!
AF
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