Motorcycle accident interactions

[atx2a]

Glad to hear you are okay, and that Progressive has been good to you. I am a motorcycle rider myself and carry insurance with them. Regardless, its a crappy situation and I'm sorry you had to endure it. Glad all seems to have ended well.

[n5wd]

...That's an interesting point about the ambulance and your firearm. What would they have done if no one could have come to take possession of it, wait for the police before examining or treating you? That sounds like a law suit waiting to happen due to delay of treatment.

And allisji brings up an interesting point, possibly in jest, but still a valid concern given their stated "policy." A private ambulance contractor could post and refuse to accept the firearm, but a city or county ambulance service can not, can they?

As a former field paramedic and one-time supervisor at MedStar, the EMS agency covering most of Fort Worth and much of Tarrant County, I can easily say that treatment would not be delayed if you were in anything but a non-emergency condition. If you're a "load and go" or going to take the trip by helicopter, if there were no police around to take custudy of your weapon, then arrangements would be made for the cops or a supervisor to take custody when you arrived at the hospital, or at the scene after you were flown out. In the meantime, your weapon would be nice and safe in the narcotics locker, it it were large enough to hold the weapon and holster, or secured up front with the driver.

Removing a weapon from an injured person is a touchy subject - from a crew safety viewpoint, though, I don't want an armed person who has suffered a possibly debilitating injury (think closed head injuries that begin to show symptoms minutes or tens of minutes after the initial impact) in the back of my ambulance. If the patient believes they need armed protection (which HAS happened in the case of some gang shootings) then we arranged for a cop to either accompany us in the truck, or follow us to the hospital.

I can only think of one time that a patient was given a choice of being transported via ambulance or giving up her weapon. Nice little old lady had a .32 given to her by her late husband, and she didn't want to be giving it to anyone she didn't know. Since she wasn't emergent (and truly didn't really need transport by Ambulance) a short wait for her daughter to arrive on scene solved the problem.

[allisji]

Here's to hoping for a swift recovery.

That's an interesting point about the ambulance and your firearm. What would they have done if no one could have come to take possession of it, wait for the police before examining or treating you? That sounds like a law suit waiting to happen due to delay of treatment.

And allisji brings up an interesting point, possibly in jest, but still a valid concern given their stated "policy." A private ambulance contractor could post and refuse to accept the firearm, but a city or county ambulance service can not, can they?

I was posting semi-in-jest... I would assume that most medical transports have a "no firearms" policy because most hospitals/medical facilities seem to do so as well (though hospitals are required to give notice per 30.06/30.07 in order to prohibit handguns). I don't know what threat a person poses if in need of emergency medical transport while armed...

I was also told the weapon could not accompany me in the ambulance.. I got the impression what and how I handled that was ,my concern... as in, give it to a friend, the cop, or toss it in the ditch, your call sir.... you can get transported, the weapon not so much.

I wounder what happens when the weapon is discovered en route ? Do they pull over and throw it out the door? Pull over call police and wait? pull over, exit the patient from the vehicle and go have ice cream?

I was wondering this myself.

[allisji]

...That's an interesting point about the ambulance and your firearm. What would they have done if no one could have come to take possession of it, wait for the police before examining or treating you? That sounds like a law suit waiting to happen due to delay of treatment.

And allisji brings up an interesting point, possibly in jest, but still a valid concern given their stated "policy." A private ambulance contractor could post and refuse to accept the firearm, but a city or county ambulance service can not, can they?

As a former field paramedic and one-time supervisor at MedStar, the EMS agency covering most of Fort Worth and much of Tarrant County, I can easily say that treatment would not be delayed if you were in anything but a non-emergency condition. If you're a "load and go" or going to take the trip by helicopter, if there were no police around to take custudy of your weapon, then arrangements would be made for the cops or a supervisor to take custody when you arrived at the hospital, or at the scene after you were flown out. In the meantime, your weapon would be nice and safe in the narcotics locker, it it were large enough to hold the weapon and holster, or secured up front with the driver.

Removing a weapon from an injured person is a touchy subject - from a crew safety viewpoint, though, I don't want an armed person who has suffered a possibly debilitating injury (think closed head injuries that begin to show symptoms minutes or tens of minutes after the initial impact) in the back of my ambulance. If the patient believes they need armed protection (which HAS happened in the case of some gang shootings) then we arranged for a cop to either accompany us in the truck, or follow us to the hospital.

I can only think of one time that a patient was given a choice of being transported via ambulance or giving up her weapon. Nice little old lady had a .32 given to her by her late husband, and she didn't want to be giving it to anyone she didn't know. Since she wasn't emergent (and truly didn't really need transport by Ambulance) a short wait for her daughter to arrive on scene solved the problem.

thanks for the explanation sir!

[n5wd]

Here's to hoping for a swift recovery.

That's an interesting point about the ambulance and your firearm. What would they have done if no one could have come to take possession of it, wait for the police before examining or treating you? That sounds like a law suit waiting to happen due to delay of treatment.

And allisji brings up an interesting point, possibly in jest, but still a valid concern given their stated "policy." A private ambulance contractor could post and refuse to accept the firearm, but a city or county ambulance service can not, can they?

I was posting semi-in-jest... I would assume that most medical transports have a "no firearms" policy because most hospitals/medical facilities seem to do so as well (though hospitals are required to give notice per 30.06/30.07 in order to prohibit handguns). I don't know what threat a person poses if in need of emergency medical transport while armed...

I was also told the weapon could not accompany me in the ambulance.. I got the impression what and how I handled that was ,my concern... as in, give it to a friend, the cop, or toss it in the ditch, your call sir.... you can get transported, the weapon not so much.

I wounder what happens when the weapon is discovered en route ? Do they pull over and throw it out the door? Pull over call police and wait? pull over, exit the patient from the vehicle and go have ice cream?

I was wondering this myself.

Again, a lot depends on the condition of the patient. If the patient is in an emergent condition and I was the medic in the back after having discovered the weapon and the patient allowing me to take the weapon from them, I'd hand it (in the holster, hopefully!) to my partner up front and we'd hand it over to the po-po at the hospital. If the patient was declining to give the weapon up, but otherwise was conscious, alert, oriented to person/place/time/event and otherwise cooperative, we'd probably have PD meet us at the ramp to the ER because there's no way I'm taking the patient in to the ER if he's 'strapped'. If the patient was in distress, though, things change - the situation becomes one of getting the patient to higher-level care. Often those patients are not so alert, and often any confrontation with the patient becomes less a problem if they're at a less than great consciousness. Gotta use your head, but crew safety is the top of the safety pyramid, and if crew safety is compromised, then patient care can be compromised as well.

I left full-time service with MedStar in the summer of 2000, and I'd expect that nowadays there are protocols established covering these situations. Since I'm no longer active in the EMS field, though, I have no access to those policies so my info may be out-of-date.