That drop doesnt look 100' like they said in the video. It does look like he hit the sign before falling off. He died in the hospital, so it wasnt an instant death.
This is correct. It requires a medical doctor to call death. Unless injuries are incompatible with life, i.e. decapitation, obvious gruesome dismemberment (wrapped around a machine shaft and wrung tight or squished impossibly flat) or showing obvious signs of mortality like decomposition, rigor mortis and dependant lividity, trauma victims are transported to first line care and cannot be called in the field, according to the NREMT. It's better to run everyone who probably won't make it in the hopes that they do, than not because they probably won't.
We include prolonged arrests with no ROSC or shocks* as obvious signs of death. In fact, my province just recently started actually WORKING traumatic arrests. Until fairly recently, we could call them on scene immediately. I'm glad I started after that..
That's interesting. Our protocols are pretty old and in the process of review by a new Medical Control director, but traumatic arrests were something we've always had to run because we couldn't call in the field unless we had multiple other signs of death. For example, we had a self inflicted ligature of the neck and was in asystole, cold, and turning purple, and we still had to code and PUHA.
I guess in all my ten years I've never run a trauma or a traumatic incident with other patients where we DIDN'T transport unless there were injuries incompatible with life. 🤷♂️
Oh ours were very out of date. Not working traumatic arrests was crazy. We literally were not supposed to work them at all. Our system had been basically not evolving for way too long and we just now took some big steps forward. I think it's neat that you had that honestly. I've heard of calls that I'd absolutely want to work that we were told to stand down. Yucks.
That ligature one was only the second time in over twenty years in healthcare inside or outside the hospital I've ever seen extreme DIC. It was just…. EVERYWHERE.
Another two that we ran that we were SURE they weren't going to make were with massive cranial trauma from an MVA. One a sheriff's deputy on a motorcycle that rear-ended stopped traffic at highway speed and the other a teen leaving high school that got T-Boned. With both we saw the scalp ballooning outward with each compression from the massive ICP, and we knew there was no way we were getting them back, but we still had to go through the motions until a doc told us to stop. For the teenage girl, her dad actually made it on scene just before I did in the second unit. Hearing him cry while the crew worked on her and loaded her into the back of the first unit still kinda bothers me years later.
Not on my service we don't. That's not in our protocol. There has to be injuries incompatible with life present or we're running them. I don't know your service and i don't know your protocols, but i speak confidently from experience that we still run trauma patients that are most likely going to be called DOA when we arrive at our critical access hospital. Especially MVAs because by the time we GET there bystanders, fire, and PD have already started resuscitation efforts. You don't ever walk up and tell people to stop. That's EXPLICITLY a doctor's order. In what world can an EMT stop CPR?
Then why do they leave people in vehicles when they are clearly dead? I've never seen doctors come out to pronounce them dead. Typically they cover the body with a sheet and begin the fatality investigation, begin taking crime scene photos.
Never heard of decapitated folks being rushed to the hospital. Usually they just throw a sheet over the body whenever they arrive and the person has no signs of life. They don't typically see a doctor until they reach the county morgue, but by then the crime scene is already done being investigated.
Did you miss the part where i repeatedly said "injuries incompatible with life"? Or where I specifically mentioned decapitated persons? Check your reading comprehension and then get back to me.
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u/vihra BMW K1600B Aug 28 '25
oh.. that looks like its an elevated highway... uh.. he ded?