Category: Compassion

• How do you say Goodbye?

  

  Two weeks ago, during what I thought would be a routine telepsychiatry appointment, Monalisa told me something I wasn’t prepared to hear. Our next appointment would be our last. We were reviewing how the medications were doing. A recent increase in Effexor had helped resolve a brief resurgence of depressive symptoms that had begun to…

  Dave

  January 16, 2026

  Compassion, Family, Mental Health, Outside Life, patients, Random Thoughts

  Family, memories, mental health, remember, sad, thinking

• The Chair

  

  On Location My first real job out of college wasn’t in medicine, or anywhere near an ambulance. It was in lighting — the kind that makes concerts glow, trade shows sparkle, and corporate galas look like the Grammys. The company was called On Location Lighting Systems, or OLLS, based out of northern Kentucky just south…

  Dave

  November 11, 2025

  Compassion, Family, Humor, mental health, Outside Life, Random Thoughts

  busy, coworkers, Family, friends, memories, mental health, regret, remember, sad, thinking, work

• A Mental Health Odyssey

  

  The author shares his journey through major depressive disorder, anxiety, and social phobia while working as an EMS provider. Despite having effective treatment for years, he experiences a decline in mental health in late 2023, prompting medication changes and the need for a temporary leave of absence. The narrative includes personal challenges, medication adjustments, struggles…

  Dave

  May 19, 2025

  Compassion, EMS, Family, mental health, Outside Life, Professional Pride, Random Thoughts, trauma

• McClain, Paramedics, Qualified Immunity, Other Thoughts

  Elijah McClain, Paramedics, Qualified Immunity, and Other Thoughts on Professionalism

  Dave

  December 24, 2023

  cardiac arrest, Compassion, EMS, overdoses, patients, Police, Professional Pride, provider safety, Public Safety, safety

  deputy, EMS, firefighter, ketamine, law enforcement, mental health, news, patients, Police, provider safety, Public Safety, qualified immunity

• Revisiting Mental Health…. Again…. and Again…

  I wrote about the Code Green Campaign back in 2016 in my post about calling a code on our mental health. I was talking about how some of my “ghosts” haunt me, revisit me, remind me of some of the worst calls I’ve ever been on. It happens to me frequently. At night. During the…

  Dave

  November 30, 2022

  Compassion, Death and Dying, EMS, Family, mental health, Public Safety

• Lifesaver? Hardly.

  This lifesaver pin was presented to me to celebrate my first CPR “Save” – when, early in my EMS career, I worked as part of a team of EMS professionals to apply CPR (Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation) to a Sudden Cardiac Arrest victim, and this resulted in the patient having their pulse restored long enough to be…

  Dave

  January 17, 2021

  cardiac arrest, Compassion, Death and Dying, EMS, patients, Professional Pride

• The People Who Make Up My Life

  I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how people move in and out of my life. Quickly. Slowly. Suddenly and abruptly. Gradually or almost without noticing. The amount of time they spend in my life, in my physical presence seems completely unrelated to the amount of time they remain in my conscious and subconscious mind…

  Dave

  October 12, 2020

  childbirth, Compassion, Death and Dying, elderly, EMS, Family, mental health, Outside Life, overdoses, patients, pediatric, Random Thoughts

• EMS Week 2020!

  It’s EMS WEEK 2020! It sure doesn’t feel like it, though. Usually as we are approaching this week, we’re talking about crew breakfasts, the EMS week banquet, service recognition events, team-building, and other fun events. Instead, our discussions are focused on things like PPE utilization, COVID alert rates, disease spread, and community fatality rates. Much…

  Dave

  May 17, 2020

  Compassion, EMS, mental health, Professional Pride, provider safety, Public Safety

• Connecting with a Drug Overdose Patient

  She’s only 20 years old*. 15 years younger than me. Laid out on the ground in front of the house. It’s 40 degrees outside at 1am here in Texas. Her boyfriend woke up and found her not breathing and did CPR on her while waiting for us to show up. The police showed up first…

  Dave

  December 19, 2019

  Compassion, EMS, overdoses, patients, Professional Pride

• I owe some of you an apology…

  Throughout my EMS career, I’ve often wondered why a certain subset of people call 911 so often. Seemingly minor concerns are blown way out of proportion, and, throwing logic and reason to the wind, they demand that the patient be taken to a specialty ER for examination by a specially trained physician. Who are these…

  Dave

  April 15, 2018

  Compassion, EMS, Family, Humor, Outside Life, pediatric, Random Thoughts