Steve warned me that late turns on his new station were a bit quiet (oops, I said the Q word!) and he was right. Still, I had a good evening and got to meet some nice people and have a look around the inside of an ambulance. We also managed a grand total of two calls in our seven hour shift!

The first was to a ninety-year-old lady who had had a fall in her driveway and bumped her lip. She was up by the time we arrived and the only sign of her fall was a graze on her lip. Steve and his crewmate examined her and gave her the good news that she wouldn’t have to go to hospital if she didn’t want to (she didn’t). The whole family were a joy to meet and quite unlike most of the people I am accustomed to speaking to. The eight year old granddaughter wanted to be a doctor when she grew up and gave everyone an accurate running commentary of what the crew were doing. She was very bright and I wouldn’t be surprised if she does end up a doctor. Another, smaller, child was very excited to see the ambulance and said it was just like Holby City. The patient’s daughter thanked us for getting there so quickly and told us what a great job we do, and the patient shook us all by the hand before we went. She looked closer to seventy than ninety!

If only all calls were to people like that!

The second was to another elderly person who’d fallen over. This one had not had quite such a lucky escape. His wife had explained that he had fallen several hours ago, but managed to get himself up and hadn’t thought he needed hospital. As the day wore on, his leg had become more painful and he had decided maybe he did need to go after all. His wife had tried to get him out to the car, but he just couldn’t make it. Indeed, when we arrived he was precariously propped on a dining chair in the hallway. I could see straight away that one of his legs was hanging at a funny angle. Steve and his crewmate got him out to the ambulance on a carry chair, and there was a bit of palaver getting him on to the trolleybed — the offending leg was just too painful. In the end, Steve had to get out the Entenox. Our patient suddenly began speaking in a squeaky voice and becoming unduly amused by the heart monitor. Then, disaster struck…

“I feel a bit sick…” muttered the patient, turning distinctly green.

You may recall that vomit is my Achilles’ Heel. Just the smell of it makes me want to join in and create vomit of my own. I don’t care if patients spray me with diarrhoea, wee on my head or bleed all down my nice green trousers, but give me vomit and I’m off. I started scrambling with the ambulance cupboard in an attempt to get the vomit bowls out, but in my haste couldn’t move the door. Steve came to my rescue. For some reason he was laughing really hard.

And of course, after all that, the patient didn’t vomit.

Once I had stopped worrying about low flying puke, Steve showed me how the patient’s left leg was shorter than his right one and was drooping to one side. This, he explained, is indicative of a neck of femur fracture. No wonder the poor man was in so much pain!

We got him to the local hospital and for once there wasn’t a long delay handing over (!) so we left him in the care of the nice nurses and went back to the ambulance station, just in time to catch the Chelsea vs Barcelona match on the television. Miraculously, the phone didn’t ring once throughout the whole match (well, it did, but it was someone trying to sell us a fitted kitchen). I guess all the punters were busy watching the match too!

Once again, thank you to Steve and his crewmate and all the other lovely people at Somewhere Ambulance Station for making me feel so welcome! I’m going to be joining Steve again soon for a Saturday day shift, which I’m reliably informed are more action packed, but if there’s any crews from Whipps Cross or nearby reading this who would like to take me out as an observer, I’d be really grateful too. It’s an awfully long way to go to rideout with Steve and it makes dayshifts almost impossible. Anyone willing, drop me an email - mark at neenaw.co.uk. Thanks!

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