EMS Conference

I attended State EMS Conference the weekend of July 14. At this conference we attend four 1.5 hour classes each Friday and Saturday, and 2 classes on Sunday. These classses were given by professional speakers. These are doctors, EMT Paramedics, and / or nurses. They are all very knowledgable in the topics they have choosen to speak about.

This year I attended a couple of classes by Steve Berry. He is a Paramedic from Colorado and also a cartoonist. He gave a very heartwrenching talk on mourning. This talk was from the heart as he had lost his partner of 15 years and had gone through a very difficult time dealing with her death. I found it very comforting the way he incorportated his cartoons, photos of Kim, and many pictures of Colorado as he lead us down the path he had taken trying to find his way back from this very painful place he was in.

The booklet we all received warned us not to take this class if you were only there for credits, and that was a wise statement. There were many times during his talk that there was not a dry eye in the room, male or female it didn't matter.

What Steve did that morning was teach us that even though we spend a great amount of our lives trying to help others or even save their lives, we can't always do that for our loved ones or others that are close to us. Because of that we sometimes don't know how to deal with these feelings. He let us know that to cry while on a run, only shows that we are compassionate, not unprofessional. Careing and Feeling are good things. It's when we no longer feel that we are in trouble.

Experience taking this course

I have enjoyed taking this course. I has been a challenge for me, but not in the ways that I thought it might be. The writing of the speeches was no problem for me. My problems seemed to always have to do with finding time to go and do the research on the topics I chose. With all I have going on it seems I never have time to do homework until after 8 or 9pm and then I'm up till all hours.

There are no excuses, but life really got in the way for this course. My daughter went through a divorce and we ended up watching the children more than usual. I love my grandchildren dearly and love spending time with them, however, homework doesn't get done with them around. The two year old always wants to push the keys on the keyboard and the four year old wants to play games.

I have learned many new things because of the research I have done and am glad that I was able to complete this course of study. Even if it did take me FOREVER. I believe I am a better publice speaker because of it. It certainly brought back some memories of all those demostrations we used to do for 4-H some 30-35 years ago.

Experience preparing Persuasive Speech #2.

This was a challenge. The hardest part was coming up with a topic. Once I had decided on Mammograms and Breast Self-Exams, I decided to check out some websites and see what I could find out about this screening process. At first I thought it was going to be hard to get enough information as all the websites I found had the same information.

Then I remembered that my sister had been diagnosed 2 years ago and had a bad full of books I could read. I got alot of information from 1 of those books. However, some of the statistics were old and I had to cross reference the data so I had the most recent numbers.

Writing the speech was easy. Having lived through this experience made it that much more real.

I was working on the power point presentation, when after 2.5 hours I decided to take a break. When I came back to the presentation, the computer would not open the power point documents, stating something it could not recognize the path. I was really broken hearted. So I did it over today, and for some reason, luckily the document opened. I could have kissed the ground.

All aspects of this assignment are complete as of midnight tonight, with the exception of taping. I think I will wait to do that when my eyes are fully open.

The presenting factor should not even be a factor as this speech pretty much wrote it self. I should have no trouble with the taping of it.

The Dive Team

I attended a continuing ed class on Dive Teams. It was very interesting. There were 3 speakers: Ryan Smith, Terry Seals, and John Bartling. They are all firemen for Kearney Vol. Fire Department. This class was held June 20, 2006 at 7pm. It was a telecommunications class.
These classes are really helpful to our EMT's in the rural community. We can get our continuing ed hours and not have to drive 2 or 3 hours to attend the class. Another added bonus is that if there is an ambulance call in our area we are still available to cover that call.

This class was an extemporaneous speech. Ryan pretty much got up and talked from personal experience. Relating to us how to call for the dive team if needed, and what we would need to do to help them out when they arrived. He also talked about some of the procedures that we would see as they carried out their mission.

Terry talked about the equipment that they use for their dives. They sure have some sophisticated equipment. Our job as the EMT's on the shoreline would be to care for the victim if recovered and resusicable, but also we are there for the divers. They may need assistance if anything goes wrong with the dive. They also went over how to remove the dive suits if needed.

This was a very interesting class. There were no slides, however they did have actual equipment available and showed that as they talked about each piece.

Relay for Life

June 5, 2006 was the date of the most recent Relay for Life meeting. It was held at the Superior City Library. The meeting was conducted by our Chairman LaMira Mueller and the American Cancer Representative Kim.
As our event is to take place June 23, 2006 we had several different speakers. Each committee chairman spoke about what they had completed and what still needed to be done before the event.
It appears that most all the committees have everything on schedule. For an event like this there are many things that have to be done at the last minute.
I would say that all the pre planning preparations have been very organized and well thought out. Each committee has members that are veterans to this event and know what has worked well in the past. This helps out immensely. All supplies and props that we need have been arranged and spoken for. It is just a matter now of putting them together and collecting and counting all the monies that night.
It should be a good time once again, with all the money going to a very good cause.

Propel Commercial

Monroe's Motivated Sequence applies to the Propel commercial in the following manner.

This commercial grabs our ATTENTION by starting with a basicly blank screen. All you see are a bottle of water and water drops. As each drop is about to hit bottom a athlete drops out and immediately begins playing their respective event.

We are led to believe that we NEED this water to maintain our bodies natural state of hydration. They tell us that it has just the right balance of electrolytes to keep us going.

Our SATISFACTION is taken care of by showing us strong and healthy athletes that appear to be ready to take on any opponent.

Our VISUAL needs are appeased by showing us strong, healthy, and good looking actors to play the parts of these athletes. We are made to believe that by drinking this water we too will do better in our outdoor activities and other sporting events.

ACTION comes into play as we are encouraged to go out and stock up on Propel water for our use when playing or working hard in the events that take all we've got.

TV Commercial

Michelin Tires (not spelled right) There are 2 commercials that show safety. One is the baby sitting inside the tire with all kinds of bad weather going on and the baby is just playing safe and sound.

The other is a race car where they want the driver to come to a spinning stop. Each time he tries the car just stops on a dime, and the director fires the driver, the car door opens and the Michelin man gets out of the car.

Both ads state how safe you are with their tires between your car and the road.

Sermon for May 21, 2006

Our Redeemer Lutheran Church Superior, NE is the setting for the sermon given by PMA Irvin Schleufer, on Sunday morning May 21, 2006. It is 9 am and we are all settling in for the regular order of our service. Today's lessons are talking about Peter baptizing Gentiles, a ritual that had normally been done only to the Jews. And his response was that if they had received the Holy Spirit just as the Jews, they too should receive the water for baptism.

Then Irvin went on to compare this to our reaching out to the immigrants in generations past and the way that we treat them now. We should stop and make them feel welcome in the sense that God is wanting when he talks about spreading the Word of God.

He spoke from the heart. He used his notes and bible when using specific quotes, but otherwise he was speaking pretty much directly to each of us. This topic seemed to be something he truly cared about. With all the current emphasis on immigration he used these bible passages to put a new light on what we should be doing to put our best hand forward to help these people out, and possibly help them, help themselves at the same time.

As usual I left church feeling a lot better about myself and the world around me. Irvin has a fine way of accomplishing this. I feel that he has found his true calling with this career.

Sensitive Communication

Ron Willis presented an Inservice at the Presbyterian Church in Superior, NE on May 16, 2006 at 0800. This was a four hour presentation on Sensitive Communication. Ron has been giving these types of talks for nearly 20 years. He is a retired counselor and worked with troubled teens. He has many stories that help to bring to life his ideas of how we should treat both others and ourselves.

One of his favorite sayings is that, "It was alot easier to put out the fire once I found out I was the arsonist."

Another thing I learned from him is that sometimes it is better to wait to say what needs to be said, until what needs to be said will come out in a much better voice.
Example, when someone makes you unhappy. It is much better to talk about it when you have had time to cool off a bit and talk about it in a civil tongue.

Another, "Don't be mad for someone, be mad (or hurt) with someone." Example he gave. His son had asked a girl to dance at the junior high dance and she turned him down infront of everyone. His wife told the son, they would have a dance at their house and not invite that girl. It didn't make his son feel any better because he still wanted to dance with her. Ron, told him how embarassed he knew he must have felt at that moment, because he to had been turned down. His son related to this and soon he was feeling much better and was ready to go and try asking this girl on another date of some kind.

Ron is a very entertaining speaker who likes to pull his audience into his presentations. If your not careful you may soon become part of what is happening. This happens to many of the participants during the four hours.

Even if you go to this presentation reluctantly, you will go home having learned something about yourself and how you can become a better person.

Class - Oximeter/Glucometer

Dixie Siemsen presented a class for Superior Vol. Rescue Squad and Brodstone Memorial ambulance Service personnel on May 23, 2006 at 7:30 pm at the Public Safety Building in Superior, NE. This class covered the use of the Pulse Oximeter and Glucometer machines that we use on our ambulance services.

Both of these items have recently been approved as scope of practice of EMT-B's as an add on. Therefore we had to have a state approved EMS Instructor conduct a class for us on their proper use.

We had all had some basic training on these items in our original classes, but needed to go over them more in depth for certification purposes.

We now know what is considered normal ranges for both oxygen and blood sugar levels in our bodies, and how to treat a patient who is below those levels. As for blood sugar we also know what to do if they are above normal levels.

Dixie had power point slides that gave us a moderate amount of statistics along with basic anatomy. This helped us identify landmarks that she was speaking of in her lecture.

Dixie is a very good speaker. This was quite obvious in the scores we received on our quizzes that are required as part of the State Certification. She has been doing this a long time and it is obvious that she really enjoys it.

Incident Management

Incident Management Workshop put on by Kevin Badgley Paramedic for Good Samaritan Health Services in Kearney, NE. It was held May 16, 2006 at Brodstone Memorial Hospital. We watched this on the telecommunication system. The original site was Good Samaritan Hospital in Kearney, NE. This was Part 2 of a 2 part class. I was unable to attend part 1 but the hand outs followed through the entire workshop so that made it easy to catch up to where the second class started.
Kevin had a lot of personal experiences to add to the lecture which gave personality to his talk. It also made it easier to understand some of the descriptions.
His manner of speech was extemporaneous, I never saw him use any notes. He must of had all the prompts he needed on the power point slides. His slides were very simple. The pictures were very easy to see and showed his points well.
There were problems on their end with their equipment. They could not get the slides to come through to the telecommunications sites. However, we got along fine with the handouts. After the first break, they used a different procedure and we were able to see the slides just fine.
The second item I found distractive was that he laughed at himself often. He wasn't that funny either. This became quite annoying. On the other hand he was very knowledgeable on the subject he was talking about and probably had a lot of experience in dealing with incidents where these command systems had been very helpful. He brought to our attention some instances where these systems could be used which we had not thought of before.

EMT Practice

Cindy Bates
EMT Practice - Topic Keeping the Ambulance Clean and Stocked
4-25-06 7:30 pm
Public Safety Building
Superior, NE

Tonight we had our monthly EMT practice. It was my turn to conduct the practice session. I decided to present why it is important to keep the ambulance clean and stocked at all times.
When your job is to take care of sick or injured persons on a moments notice you can not be looking for something or wondering if it was cleaned since the last call. We must always leave the ambulance clean and stocked when we are finished with our call so it is ready for the next crew when they go out next time the pagers go off.

We took the trauma bags and jump kits to the basement of the fire station and made sure they were restocked with all the appropriate supplies. We also put away all the items that had just come in on the last shipment from our supplier.

This speech was pretty much an impromptu speech as I spoke my mind and stated some pretty obvious facts. Like no one likes to reach for something on a call only to find it is missing or dirty, so we must all work together to keep our ambulances in top notch order.

Unit 2 Mod 9

I have finished Informative Speech #2. All the resources have been found and incorporated into my speech, the outline typed, and works cited finished. However, the works cited was a bit of a challenge this time as all of the works are online sources that have no authors. I hope that I have prepared this in the correct format. All that is left to do is tape the speech. I am still in the practice stage. Hopefully tomorrow I will be ready to do the taping. This evening I tried, but I kept forgetting large portions of my resource quotes, so I have been reciting them over and over for the last couple of hours. I sure hope that helps.

I found a very large amount of information on the internet regarding smoking. I started out planning to do my speech on how to quit. As I surfed the sites, I became interested in all the ways smoking is harmful to both the smoker and non smoker and decided to change my topic to why you should quit, using my dad as an example.

I know that this information is sound and have seen many of the examples for myself as I have cared for patients in the ER with several of the diagnosis which I talk about. Quite often they or someone in their home smoke or have smoked in the past.

Maundy Thursday Service

Irvin Schleufer PMA conducted our church service on the Thursday before Easter at Our Redeemer Lutheran Church in Superior, NE.

It went along pretty much like any other church service, as far as the order of events is concerned. When it came time for the sermon everyone settled in for the usual subject. Instead Irvin had chosen to speak to us about why Jesus had chosen each of the 12 apostles. Thomas - was the one that always needed to see things for himself. Simon - had hatred. This shows us that anger is not above any of us. Matthew - keeps account of everything. His was the official record of Jesus works. Andrew - brought Simon Peter to Jesus, this shows us that we don't always have to be in the lime light. Judas - always believed in Jesus, knew the continued plan for Jesus. Just shows us that Gods plan is not always Jesus plan. Simon Peter denied Jesus 3 times - this also fulfilling his prophecy. It was very interesting. So much so that I found myself taking notes. That has not happened to me since confirmation class when it was required.

Irvin started at our church not long after he was finished with his schooling. Over the last 3 years or so he has certainly made great gains in his speaking skills. This sermon is a great example of that.

Relay For Life

Tonight I attended a monthly meeting in preparation for the Nuckolls Co. Relay For Life. It is held at the Superior City Library and usually takes place in two parts. Part 1 being where I participate. It is for the committee members. We have probably 10 different committees. I am on the Ambulance committee. Our job is to provide care to the Relay participants during the 12 hour event.
The leader of these meetings is Kim, she works for the American Cancer Society. She brings an agenda, calendar, sign-up sheets, and any other information that we may need from headquarters. She is a very up-beat young lady, always cheerful and willing to help get everyone started or over any obstacle that they may be experiencing. She is a huge asset to our group. Also, because of her position, she has to opportunity to see many ideas from other events, and sometimes can give us a heads up about what does or doesn't work well for other counties.
So far we have come up with a slogan, location, and date for the event. We have a DJ and an entertainment committee is hard at work on many of the ideas to keep the audience entertained throughout the evening. We plan to have many games that will take place late into the night and early morning to keep the participant's awake and motivated until the closing ceremony at 6 am.
The meetings to date have all taken place in a timely manner and had positive courses of action.
The next meeting will be May 1, 2006 at 5:30 pm and will also take place at the Superior City Library. We will however have a kickoff party April 8, 2006 to celebrate our event and get our county involved.

Small group meeting

Small group meetings sound like the type of meeting I am used to attending. This format is used at our EMT meetings, church, and Relay For Life meetings.
There are usually between 4 to 15 members present depending on which meeting we are talking about. Most often we have a designated leader who has done some preliminary research in the topic at hand.
At the EMT and Relay For Life meetings we have preset committees and each has a specific job to do. When each committee comes to the meeting prepared we can usually make efficient use of our time and energy.
At both of these meetings the members come from a diverse background of careers and for that reason they bring a sufficient number of ideas to chose from. Most often we are able to get along and make an educated decision to come up with our final plan of action. As was discused in our text, if each person comes to the meeting prepared it makes short work at the actual meeting, and we will all be rewarded with an event that is well received by all that attend. For the EMT's this may be an event that will recruit more EMT students to increase the size of our squad, or for the Relay For Life an increase in the number of teams that will particpate or that the speaker of choice has accepted our invitation to participate in this event.

Lent Service 3-29-06

The Lent service last evening was presented by Esther Martin. She is a member of the Women of the ELCA.
Last evening's service talked about mercy and how Jesus lived his life in his last week. She had 6 members of the congregation read various bible passages at their assigned time. These helped by giving us actual accounts from the bible. As happens from time to time, the bible seems to leave things unclear, she also had examples from modern times to help us relate to what he is talking about.
Jesus did many things in his last week to prove his servitude to his disciples and others around him.
It was very interesting to realize that he knew everything that would take place all the way to the end, and yet he still did not hide or run away.
This service was held at Our Redeemer Lutheran Church in Superior, NE. on Wednesday, March 29, 2006.