Ambulance Operations

The last duty you have is to transport the patient if it is warranted. You need to get consent from the patient and documentation as to why they refused transport if this was done but, in all other situations, you will end your care of the patient with transporting them to an appropriate facility.

There is one duty that isn t always considered but is still important. You have the duty to mitigate the mistakes and incompetence of your fellow providers. This means that you could be held accountable if another provider engages in substandard performance and you do nothing.

AMBULANCE OPERATIONS

Ambulance operations refers to your ability to manage your vehicle and get to and from an incident scene at all times. You need to be able to control your vehicle throughout the call in a variety of environments without compromising the safety of those who are using the roadways and the occupants of the rig. This involves driving defensively, avoiding collisions, being aware of other drivers intentions, and reducing the damage when accidents are unavoidable.

Things you need to do include being aware of blind spots, cross intersections safely, change lanes, maneuver the vehicle, manage distractions, handle fatigue, and drive in a variety of weather conditions you might encounter. This involves practice at handling an ambulance before actually doing it as part of your job and learning how to do vehicle maintenance. There will be blind spots that are partially mitigated by the use of special mirrors to help you see through those blind spots. Cell phones and map reading should not be a part of driving an ambulance.

When driving the ambulance, you need to use the proper signals, drive only when not terribly fatigued, and maintain a safe following distance—using the three-second rule for stopping behind another vehicle. Intersections are the main location for ambulance accidents so you ll need to slow, even if you are using lights and sirens. If an accident is unavoidable, you should try to reduce the damage to all vehicles.

As for speed, you shouldn t exceed the posted limits by greater than 10 miles per hour and should stay at the posted speed when going through an intersection, even if there is