Paramedic Saturday

I just came out of the shower. Sadly the water was already cold (I probably used too much in the morning), so I am more awake now than I wanted to be.

Anyway, I was working as a paramedic today and had my first COVID-19 positive patient. We transported him from one hospital to one about an hour drive away where currently all severe coronavirus cases are summed.

Besides my codriver putting on a whole-body suite, we also had to disinfect the whole car after the transport. Which means the following timetable:

• preparing the car for the transport (about 15 minutes, including my codriver getting into gear).
• getting the patient into the car (another 10 to 15 minutes)
• driving to the destination (about an hour)
• “getting rid of the patient at the destination” (this time about 45 minutes)
• disinfecting the car (about 45 minutes)
• driving back to hour home base (again about an hour).

Which sums up to about 4 hours. Obviously this wasn’t the only patient we took care of, but it was a large chunk of the 12-hour shift.

What I really felt today is the exhaustion of the nurses, doctors and other hospital staff. Everything seems a little bit chaotic and nobody seems to have a clear plan currently. But the Styrian Health System seems to handle the situation pretty good still. It will be interesting to see how this will evolve in the next weeks.

Also, I want to let my small rant out about wearing a mask all day. I know it is important to keep safe, but keeping it on the face the whole day, and breathing through it the whole day, it is really exhausting to breathe.

Sure you get used to it, but still, it is annoying.