Ford Econoline 350 Emergency Vehicle

LonelyIslands

Canada590 Posts

February 16 2012 21:53 GMT

For those who have read my blogs before, they probably know that I'm a Primary Care Paramedic in Canada. After a friend asking me a few questions about what kind of equipment we use and what the inside of the Ambulance is like, I decided I would take a few pictures and share it with everyone. Growing up a lot of people are generally familiar with Fire Trucks and Police Cars, but Ambulances was always a mystery to me until I became a Paramedic. So for those of you whom are in the same boat, hopefully this will be interesting.

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This is an older diesel model, the newer trucks run on a gasoline engine. I guess I'm biased towards the diesel, it has more power, seems to handle better in poor road conditions and is much more reliable. The fuel consumption is drastically different in the two, the diesels get way more mileage than their gasoline counterparts. I've done a routine transfer from hospital to hospital in both rigs, the diesel costs about $80 while the gasoline is up around $120.

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This is looking in through the passenger side door, in this picture you can see our computer in the middle (Panasonic Toughbooks), our radio attached to the dash and our lights and siren board behind the computer. This console also controls the PA system.

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Here is a better shot of the computer. When we receive a call all the information the dispatcher receives is displayed here. We can mark our unit responding, at scene, at destination and send messages to other units. It has a GPS on it and we can look up addresses. We can also AutoMap an address to give us an idea of what the most ideal route would be (IE: The quickest). We also have old fashion maps as a back up if this fails.

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This is the panel that controls the lights and sirens. We have three sirens, Wail, Yelp and Phaser. We also have an Air Horn for people who just don't hear the previous three. Wail is pretty standard, Yelp is good for when you're in a populated area or downtown, Phaser is mostly used a lot when proceeding through intersections. This panel also has the PA Volume, the emergency light controls of the Ambulance and a Aux/Main battery switch. We run three batteries in the trucks to power our gear, if one fails, we can start the truck with the second.

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Here is a view from the back of our trucks, through the rear doors. In this picture you can see our stretcher, bench seat to the right of the stretcher which holds our Traction Splints, Normal Splints, Flares, Rope, Decontamination gear, Tools, Bed pans, Urinals and items of that sort. To the immediate right in the back is our stair chair, it's used to move people up or down flights of stairs when we can not use the stretcher, it's a pretty cool item. To the left is our spine boards, immobilization gear for spinal injuries and a fire extinguisher. You can also see the net (Nurse Catcher) that prevents us from flying into the front if the truck was in a collision. At the head of the stretcher we have our Airway chair, to the right of that we have our first in bags. The phone that you see on the right wall allows us to radio in to the hospital to give them a report as to whats coming in.

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Here's another look into the back.

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Ok, lets start with the top. The cabinet at the back holds linen for making our stretcher. The orange bag at the top is our trauma bag, this has scissors, pen lights, numerous amounts of bandages in all shapes and sizes, wet dressings, dry dressings, burn sheets, IV kits and supplies, stethoscope, hot and cold packs. It's pretty well put together.

The red bag under that is our medication bag. It has the medication that we use (Benedryl Elixir and Vials, ASA, Salbutamol MDIs and Aerosols, Oral Glucose, Nitro, Glucagon, D50, Epi, and Narcan). This bag has an IV kit and a kit for injections, it has a bio-hazard bag, razor and a load of other supplies. The top compartment also has our intubation gear and lyrngoscope and magills forceps for foreign body obstructions. It also has our glucometer to read peoples BGL.

The monitor below that is our Phillips MRX that we can use to get vitals, view the heart with a three lead system and defib patients in cardiac arrest. It's a $30, 000 piece of equipment and its heavy as shit. It has numerous sizes of blood pressure cuffs, and comes with QCPR to aid us in compression depth during CPR.

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This is our airway bag, it has our oxygen, different size masks, pocket face masks, BVMs for adult, pede and infant, towels, OPAs and NPA airway devices. It's basic but very important.

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This is the suction device that we have inside the truck. We also carry a portable one that sits in front of the blue bag. It's not something you have to use often, but very important to have handy for people who have a head injury, etc, where they are immobilized and vomiting.

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This is Cabinet 1, it has a box of the different sizes of gloves, a pen lights, scissors, vomit bags, Kleenex, and various sized blood pressure cuffs.

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Cabinet 2 has our IV supplies, different gauge catheters, etc. Cabinet 3 has our trauma supplies, a lot like whats in the trauma bag, but it also has a burn kit for people badly burned.

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The top Cabinet has our BVMs and more airway gear, the bottom cabinet has more decon gear and sterile water for rinsing out wounds, etc.

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The top Cabinet has our isolation gear for people who have MRSA, VRE or another contagious bacteria/virus. The Cabinet below has our teddy bear and cords for the computer in the front, the monitor on the shelf and a vinyl rescue seat we can use to move smaller patients.

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This is our Airway cabinet, it has adult and pede and infant gear, from masks to OPAs and NPAs. It has spare regulators for our oxygen tanks and a pocket face mask.

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Lighting controls in the back of the truck (the buttons), the thing to the left is an Oxygen regulator, its what we hook our masks up to. To the far right is the thermostat. Let me tell you this, it doesnt matter what time of the year it is, the back of an Ambulance is fucking hot.

That's pretty much all I've got for now.. if you have any questions or what not feel free to ask. I hope someone found it interesting.

fabiano

Brazil4644 Posts

February 16 2012 22:07 GMT

woah, pretty cool that you shared it in details.

that ambulance seems to be pretty high-end.

kanada

Canada255 Posts

February 16 2012 22:07 GMT

Awesome, always wondered what was back there. I can't imagine having to refill this equipment. Not to mention the cost. Great blog.

LonelyIslands

Canada590 Posts

February 16 2012 22:10 GMT

We have a provincial wide system, currently we have about 140 Ambulances in the province and they are all identical to this. The cost of a one of these new is about $130, 000 with all the equipment. They weigh close to 5 tons, which is almost at the limit for the chasis. We restock after each call, the service gets deals for buying in such bulk. A ride to the hospital in one of these, regardless of what is used is $138. Soon they will be free, at least thats what the government is telling us.

Sermokala

United States14115 Posts

February 16 2012 22:10 GMT

no offence but should you really be telling the internet everything thats in an ambulance and where it is? a lot of that stuff probably would get a really high price on the drug market

LonelyIslands

Canada590 Posts

February 16 2012 22:13 GMT

We don't carry narcotics or pain medication. There is nothing that someone could steal that would be worth money on the "drug market" or that would get you high for that matter. Let me elaborate...

ASA - If someone was to take enough of this it would cause liver damage. It's also available over the counter at any gas station, pharmacy, or store..

Benadryl - It's for allergic reactions, if you were to overdose on this it would make you lethargic, that's about it. Enough could cause respiratory depression I guess, but we don't carry enough of it on the truck.

Salbutamol/Ventolin - Anyone who has asthma has probably had this, enough of this would make your heart race.

Oral Glucose - Used to raise someones sugar levels, we carry two tubes, it might make you queezy but I doubt it.

Nitro - You could bottom our your blood pressure, but the side affects of taking this is a bad bad headache, so why?

Glucagon - We carry 2mg, its also for people who have low sugar and arnt candidates for Oral Glucose. It's not going to hurt you..

D50 - I guess you could raise your sugar levels quite a bit with this, but you'd have to be able to start an IV on yourself to administer it.

Narcan - For people who OD on demoral, heroin, etc, it kicks that out of the receptor and takes its place. We carry 10 x 1ml ampules, each containing 0.4mg of medication. You could inject all of it and its not going to do anything to you.

Epi - I guess you could OD on this and increase your heart rate to dangerous levels, but why?

A lot of these meds need to be delivered IV or mixed before administered, most people wouldn't have the knowledge of how and if they did, they would know taking any of these are completely useless as a means to get "high".

Risen

United States7927 Posts

February 16 2012 22:15 GMT

On February 17 2012 07:10 sermokala wrote:
no offence but should you really be telling the internet everything thats in an ambulance and where it is? a lot of that stuff probably would get a really high price on the drug market

This seems like a really stupid point to bring up.

1) It's Canada, crime is quite low there.
2) What are the odds of someone on TL wanting to steal from there.
3) What are the odds ambulances are set up the same in different locations? So he's really only got to worry about someone wanting to steal from his ambulance, in his area, and they have to be of the same company as his.

You're being overly paranoid to the point of stupidity.

Why does anyone ever give a tour of anything, in your world? Someone might use that information to commit a CRIME!!!!

TL;DR: Don't come shit on a perfectly fine OP b/c you're an idiot.

To the OP: My friend works as an EMT and gave me a tour of his ambulance once, is pretty crazy what you folks manage to pull off in such a small area.

LonelyIslands

Canada590 Posts

February 16 2012 22:24 GMT

On February 17 2012 07:15 Risen wrote:

Show nested quote +

It's a rush, that's for sure. Nothing feels better than going home at night knowing you saved a life, and nothing feels worse going home knowing someone died in your hands and there was nothing you could do. I also elaborated on the drugs that we carry in my previous post, theres nothing anyone would want to steal. I know in some larger cities medics do carry narcotics but they do not usually have them in the trucks (unless its in a safe), usually they carry them locked, to their person.

Billd

Canada210 Posts

February 16 2012 22:43 GMT

Hey, where are you a paramedic in Canada? I ask because my friend is a paramedic in Halifax right now. He's also worked in the Toronto area and Newfoundland.

Cheers!