It is 3AM you wake up with medical problem that you know you or a family member cannot help you with. You are facing a true medical emergency and you, a family member, or friend does the right thing and dial 911. The squad is there in a matter of minutes doing what is needed to be done to make sure they can transport you to the hospital in a safe and timely manner while providing whatever medical treatment needed to make sure they get you there so you can get the addional medical treatment needed.
What you don’t know is that EMT working on that squad was required to complete many hours of training, testing in medical procedures and passing state standards testing just to take you to the hospital. They have save countless number of lives because of their training. So how are they taken care of while waiting for that phone call to face whatever the problem may be. They do this job out of love for the work they do because the pay will not support a family. They could earn more working for McDonalds.
If you are the EMT working out of Iberia you have no place to cook anything only a refrigerator to store the food you fixed at home because you will be there for 24 hours. The bathroom is one step above the old outhouse of days gone by. The shower does not work so if by chance you on a run and something happens and you need to clean up you wait until the end of your shift to get home to clean up. Payday comes and you might get paid for all of the hours you worked. So for the hours you did not get paid for you have to pull all the run sheets to reprove you worked the hours then wait until next payday to get paid. To bad if you have bills to be paid because you didn’t get paid so you could pay them. Also there is no benefits or retirement plan and that could be the reason many EMT’s leave and go where they are better paid and have benefits.
Morrow County is blessed to have people willing to put the needs of others first and provide first class care when and where needed.
So the question is why can’t Morrow County take better care of the EMT’s working for Morrow County?
Duane Rasey,
Mount Gilead
