** Connecticut EMS service institutes mandatory drug testing for medics involved in on-the-job fender benders
** Detroit medic survives in-ambulance heart attack while tending heart attack patient;could return to work by fall
UNITED STATES NEWS
** EMS and fire personnel in Manchester, Connecticut will now be subjected to mandatory drug screens if they happen to have any on-the-job fender benders. That is the word from The Courant (August 19) which quoted Fire Chief Robert Bycholski as puzzlingly referring to the testing as a sign of trust in department employees. Bycholski said such immediate scrutiny rules out substance abuse as a potential crash cause. In addition to the screening, the department is also tightening up its probation rules for new employees. New hires will now be on probation for a full year, rather than the current three months. The changes are part of a new 3-year contract running up to June 30, 2016.
** A Michigan paramedic who suffered a heart attack while treating a heart attack patient Friday, could return to work within two months. WXYZ (August 19) said Joseph Hardman, who has worked EMS for 15 years in Detroit, will require therapy during that time to recover from a blockage in his artery. According to the news site, he was doing CPR on a 40-year-old man in the ambulance when he suffered his own heart attack. His partner then transported both men to hospital where the duo had stents put in. Hardman said he believed survival would have been considerably less likely if he hadn’t already been en route to hospital at the time of his attack.
