Why stop there?  Why not use the national community to help trainers from across Canada share their knowledge and help to enhance each others’ programs?

Over the next few months, we will work to expand this blog with resource libraries drawn from your submitted material and moderated forums to promote healthy discussion on training matters.

A few new contributors will be coming on board in coming weeks.  They will bring some fresh perspective to the blog.  If you would like to contribute on training matters, please don’t hesitate to drop us a line or leave a comment on this post.

I look forward to hearing from you.

I made my way over to the Ambulance Dispatch Centre only to find it strangely similar but also strangely different. The equipment seemed the same, but the size and age of the centre were vastly different. Desks with adjustable keyboard heights at each station taunted me. The room was scattered with uneven soundproofing on the walls and a blue disco light over a few stations (to announce to the room when the position is on the phone).

Some of their practices seem curious to me. Repositioning ALS to an intermediate location rather than sending them all way to the event? When I asked about cross coverage for an area left uncovered due to call volume, I was told: “Cross coverage? Crews will clear long before a unit from another town would be in the area.” Hmmm. The distances between communities was astounding to me.

Transfers take forever and many of them involve a few airports to complete. Building multi-legged transfer events is the norm in this land – handing off the patient to three or four different crews was not unheard of on the way to their final destination.

One of the most consistent issues I noticed was in the practice of the locals stepping out of the room to visit the local celestially named brown java centre for a little wake up beverage. To be blunt: an Iced Venti cup needs a venti sized straw. I’ve seen them in the stores here; I know they have them.

The complaints were loud but increasingly less frequent and the morale seemed low at times. In the back of my consciousness I vaguely recall feeling the same – but that was in a bygone era. Rumours of big changes being needed by some while others are happy to come in a do their time. The desire for more staff was standard amongst the people of this land, but where would they put them? Every position was full before lunch time – and the staff continued to answer call after call after call. Yet, the phones only ring once or twice before they are answered.

It seemed like one in four calls was a transfer. The number of calls that didn’t immediately verify in their new Computer Aided Dispatch system seemed greatly exaggerated by the sheer size of their response area. They have hundreds of tiny little municipalities with names like “Strawberry”, “Blueberry Creek”, “Raspberry” and “Appledale” that the phone company doesn’t take into account when providing location data. It’s dizzying – and those are just examples of the fruit-based communities.

I am hoping that my coworkers in my home dimension recognize that I’m missing. I have tried to send word for them to be on the look out for a version of me with a goatee. That is the easiest way to spot the evil Nigiri.

The torch run, however, seems to bring with it unprecedented numbers of well wishers and partiers.  Events in Surrey thought to have 5,000 visitors had turnouts of 20,000.  The 15,000 people expected at the event in Richmond was closer to 30,000 people wanting to catch a glimpse of the Olympic spirit.  No operational plan can account for that kind of change of numbers, but the events are being handled well at all levels within our organization.

A lot of paramedics have ignored the recomendation of Cupe 873 thus immersing themselves in the Games by volunteering in all manners of roles.  I am glad to see people taking advantage of this once in a lifetime opportunity and know we would be forever regretful if we didn’t take part.

Now all the staff can have the support they need in their EMD and EMCT roles.

The exams were written and marked 3-4 weeks ago and the 6 successful candidates have been offered their stripes.  No word yet on where they will be placed, but the rumour mill has churned out everything from big  ’shakeups’ to status quo.  I highly doubt we’ll see the latter.

Recently, however, our managers have asked the Supervisors to crackdown on streaming video and audio.  It is no longer acceptable to stream anything at anytime of the day.  Policy is quite clear on the matter.  End of story.

Well … not quite. 

Staff have another way to view their videos while at work that doesn’t include the internet or streaming.  Flash drive memory capacity has come a long way over the last few years.  The dispatch staff load their favourite video content on to their 2, 4 and 8 gigabyte flash drives.  Then they use the built-in video playback software on each of our unlocked computers to watch this content when not on the phone or otherwise engaged in assigned duties.

If bandwidth is the only factor, I can see this being wrapped up.  The policy, however, also includes “BCAS employees must not: … download any programs, data or other material, except as expressly approved by the [administrators].”   This is, I assume in part, to keep a government computer safe from malicious software that could damage the computer and the network.  If that’s the intent, what exactly constitutes ‘download’ then?  Is downloading limited to pulling data in some format or another from the internet or does it also include anything that is placed (albeit temporarily) on a government computer that was taken from a foreign source?

Looking into my made up world’s future, I see a long battle raging where the living envy the dead.  It could look something like this:

1. streaming video/audio – banned
2. laptops – partially banned
3. flash drive video – pending
4. smart phone video – pending
5. portable DVD players
6. …something I can’t quite think of that is between reality and fantasy…
7. iGlasses (Apple’s next next generation video device)
8. direct input into the brain

Maybe this is all just a steaming pile of nothing.  It’s possible that my problem with video in the centre actually has nothing to do with the video at all.  Likely I just disapprove of the sound that is inevitably too loud and seems very alien with the normal sounds of a dispatch centre.  Trying to get my work done, talking to callers that I can barely hear well to begin with, is made that much more difficult when paired with Christian Bale explaining to Heath Ledger that he is Batman.

Sometimes, when the calls are put through to us they disconnected or we lose the caller for various reasons: caller hung up, bad cell connection, etc… A coworker and friend picked up a 911 call like this early in his shift recently. When he answered the phone, “BC Ambulance Service, for what city?”, he heard a baby crying in the background and man’s voice. Then the line went dead.

Cell phones and 911 can be a pain in the @$$. All we know is the address of the cell phone tower near the patient but not the patient’s actual location. Lack of this address location information makes our jobs a lot harder if the caller isn’t able to tell us where they are. This particular caller called from a cell phone. The next step is the most obvious: call them back.

No answer. Next, the call taker phoned Telus (the predominant phone company here) to try to find an address. Telus told us it was a Telus Mobility number and to call them. After calling them the call taker was told that it was actually a Bell cell phone number and to call them. The call taker worked to find a billing address from Bell who refered him to their security department. As you can imagine, this has a low probability of success due to the ‘mobile’ nature of mobile phones. The cell phone security division provided us with a billing address and a landline phone number.

He tried a call to the landline number – Pizza Hut??? No one at Pizza Hut needed our help.

The call taker, finding this a little odd, phoned the police to have them attend at the address with us for our crew’s safety. The event was created and an ambulance is started on the way.

One final attempt by the call taker was made to call the cell phone. SUCCESS!! The voice he heard earlier answered the phone:

“Hello sir … did you call 911 and disconnected? Can we help you?”

“I was worried about my friend, but everything is alright now.”

“Alright, did you hang up on 911?”

“Yup. I hung up to go check on my friend.”

The outcome? Well, a call taker in a very busy communication centre took almost 30 minutes to try to track down a caller who didn’t need help. All he needed to do was tell us he no longer required help before disconnecting.

There is a lot emphasis placed on not making prank 911 calls. I would say that these types of calls happen far more often than prank calls. Many people don’t dial ’9′ then ’1′ and wait to dial the last ’1′ to be sure they are needed. They dial up the whole number and give little thought to the consequenses of hanging up before making contact.

Please don’t hang up. We’ll try for a long time to track you down assuming the whole time you desperately need help.

Here is a list of my favourites:

1. The provincial government will legislate us back to work by the end of next week.
2. If you don’t wear your tshirt (rather than your uniform shirt), you will have your union card pulled.
3. They are just waiting for us to do something stupid so they can force us back to work.
4. The Union doesn’t want us to work OT.
5. The Union wants us to work OT.
6. All overtime is at mandatory rates.

Feel free to comment and add anything you’ve heard.  I’ll add to the list as I hear more.

While it has been argued that there is no decision to be made, members are making the choice of whether to rise up and show the public how unhappy we are with bad faith bargaining by donning a new white tshirt with a flourescent annoyance printed on both sides or, since the public don’t see us in the centre, just wear our normal uniform. 

Actually, some staff have made their choices based on other factors:

• wearing it since the tshirt is more comfortable than the regular uniform shirt,
• wearing it to show our other union brothers and sisters we support them in our job action even though we’re not seen by the public,
• wearing it when they know they won’t be seen by management,
• wearing it to avoid retaliation from other staff who are wearing them,
• not wearing it because the smaller sizes available make you look like a French cyclist,
• wearing to show off your ample male bosom,
• not wearing it to avoid discipline from management,
• wearing it only at dinner time since it’s better to soil a tshirt,
• wearing it to keep others from being singled out,
• simply giving them to a coworker to be used as a shop rag,

Where do I sit on the fence?  Well, to be honest, I’m not sure yet.  I am sure that I’ll be wearing one sooner or later, but I can’t say it won’t be for any really good reason other than to keep my tires from being slashed.

We see Management on an regular basis in the Dispatch Centre due to our proximity to regional headquarters.  They stop by to check in, ask questions or just observe.  On any given day, there are as many or more Management staff within 200 feet of our office than we have EMD/EMCT staff on duty.

Don’t get me wrong.  Without exception, the management we deal with on a day to day basis are very respectful of the Dispatch staff.  There is, however, always going to be that niggling deep down inside feeling that we are being watched.

On the other side we have our Union brothers and sisters on the street; all out looking for the same outcome.  The dispatch centre has responsibility to look out for them and the work they are doing while keeping up the strike plan outlined by our union executive.

This is where it gets dicey.  As an example, part of the strike plan was ”Crew members are not to do vehicle exchanges”.  In the dispatch centre, a manager directs me to ask a crew to switch into a spare vehicle.  I do as I am directed and am called by a strike coordinator asking me why I am directing crews to go against union direction.  Wow!  All I’ve done is as I was directed.  The crews can say no, call the manager in question or call their strike coordinator to ask for direction, but to call me out as going against union direction makes me feel like I’m caught in the middle more than I already am.

The Essential Services Order (ESO) from the Labour Relations Board (LRB) is pretty specific when it comes to following the direction of the employer.  Cupe 873 is seems to be focusing more on what we can’t do and less on what we could do.

I think it’s about time we started to get a little bit more creative in our job action.  We need the media and the public behind us which doesn’t seem to be the outcome of the road the union executive have put us on.  We need to show the public we are unhappy, without giving the impression that we aren’t still looking out for their safety.  We need to have journalists riding along with us to see how busy we are and how dangerous it can be on the streets.

This is destined to be one of those long and drawn out battles that no one will win.  The dynamic between managment and the union AND the dynamic between some of the members within the union will never be the same.  Hopefully we end up winning more than we have lost.

I see a similar pattern at work.  People do not understand why there isn’t an ambulance waiting on every corner ready to pounce from the trees onto the next emergency.  They need an ambulance and why isn’t it already there?  Doesn’t the ambulance fairy know?  I’ve tried bibbity, bobbity, boo, but it hasn’t worked so far.

I’m being overly dramatic.  But am I?  Medical emergencies seem to cause a change in brain chemistry – no matter who it is that is having the emergency.

Our latest job action has made this situation worse.  Some paramedics have taken to putting large “ON STRIKE” stickers on the sides of the ambulance.  Delays chalked up to call volume 6 months ago are now, in the eyes of the public, due to a perceived refusal to attend - seemingly job action related. 

If you read this blog (and I know at least 4 people do), get the word out.  We have issues with the employer, not the public.  We became paramedics, EMDs and EMCTs to help the people of our communities.  Up until now, that help has been at the expense of our families and ourselves.  The hope for job action outcome is that we can have a healthy family and community while being compensated appropriately.