11.21.2008- Ranting and Raving

I just want to rant and rave for a moment.

Our dispatcher is a complete power-hungry moron. He has no power, so he creates his own in an effort to make himself feel significant in the grand scheme of things. He tries to push us around and trample on us to make himself feel good like he has some say in what goes on in the organization. He has no say.


For instance, lunch. Ah lunch, we all love lunch. I am a big fella, and I LOVE lunch. I look forward to it all day. My dispatcher likes lunch as well. He goes every day at 1300 on the dot. No matter what is going on, he will leave at precisely 1300 to get his proverbial "grub" on. After he enjoys his lunch, he will undoubtedly have a well enjoyed after lunch smoke break. This is understandable. This is expected. No problem, right? Wrong! The nature of my line of work dictates and requires that I be available at ALL times. As long as I am at work, I am at the beck and call of whomever may need to reach me or requisition my services.

I say all of that to say this:
this morning we ran 6 calls before 1400 (that's 2:00pm for you civilian folk) I came in to work at 1000hrs. (that's 10:00am, try to keep up!) That is more than we normally run in 8 hours, much less 4. I am not complaining about my call volume, I love to work, I come to work to work, and I enjoy it, but here's what really irks my nerves: My partner and I pull up at the restaurant to finally get our proverbial "grub" on and the phone rings. Oh Crap! I exclaim, thinking we have another run, which displeases me. I answer to find our administrative assistant (who likes to screw our day up while the dispatcher is at lunch, but that's a different story for another time) on the other end of the line telling us about a run scheduled for 1500 that we need to get. OK, no prob. We go inside to eat, we order, and it takes 15-20 minutes to get our beverages, appetizer and finally the main course. Man, it looks great, I have been waiting all day for this!!! It was a fantastic lunch. We eat, pay and leave the restaurant to run our call. The phone rings. On the other end is our dispatcher, sounding very full, heated and wondering where we are. I said we are pulling up at the pickup location now. At this time it was 1515. He fusses about stupid mess that I don't even care to get into. We get upstairs to retrieve our patient at 1520. They fuss because the patient was supposed to be at the destination facility at 1530. Okay, I think, the destination is 3 miles from where we are, we have plenty of time, right? Wrong again! The receptionist starts fussing at no one in particular about us being "late". That is a matter of opinion, but whatever. Then she proceeds to get on the telephone, and stays on the phone for 10 minutes, attempting to find out if the facility will still accept the patient. They will. Time WASTED!!! We get to the patients room and she isn't even ready to go. Her feeding tube has to be removed, her telemetry box has to be removed her oxygen tubing has to be changed. TIME WASTED. This stuff could have been taken care of before we got there. That would have saved time and assured that the patient would be at the facility for the procedure ON TIME. After that, everything is smooth sailing. The patient was transferred and everything was taken care of.

It just pisses me off how little regard these people have for what we do and the stress we undergo just trying to solve every problem they throw at us.

I'm done.

Mac