End stage esophageal cancer. We were less than ten minutes away from the hospice center when he went. I lost his pulse midway through the transport but it came back very weak and thready. He was struggling to breathe and was on 15 liters of oxygen via a nonrebreather mask. The nurse gave him a dose of morphine before we left for Marion which was about an hour and a half away.
One second he has a strong pulse given the circumstances, he's breathing is labored and pushing 30 times a minute. I went to reassess his vitals and check on him. He's not breathing, no pulse, no response to pain. He has a D.N.R. C.C. and a D.N.I.which is a Do Not Resuscitate Comfort Care order. The other D.N.R. you can have is a C.C.A. which is Comfort Care Arrest. The difference is if someone stops breathing and has a C.C.A. then I let them be. If it's non cardiac I have to work on them. He has a comfort care which means I don't perform any interventions. D.N.I. is a do not intubate order.
We got to the hospice center and the R.N. and L.P.N. confirmed he stopped breathing and was gone. That's when it started to sink in. I couldn't take my eyes off of him.
It was hard because his sister asked that I call her if anything happened. I called her when I lost his pulse and told her he was deteriorating and I lost a pulse but got it back. I had to call her once we moved him into the bed to make him look a little more presentable for his family. Before I could say a word she had asked me if he was gone. That's when it got hard and it hit me. He went fast and painless. I know the dose of morphine he was given helped him along but I didn't put that in my run report. Before I left his sister thanked me and said I did everything I could on the way up and she was thankful that I did what work I could on him.
It made for a hard day and my EMS director met us at the door when we pulled back into the station. My partner and I found out the facility staff tried to tell dispatch that we brought the body in and left. He was a D.O.A. and there was nothing we could do you b****. I went into great length on my run report and filled out an incident report. The LPN signed my run report which means I turned care over to them. In this case I simply turned the body over to them. That is what pissed me off.
I feel bad because this is my first death under my care and the hospice staff is trying to say we dumped him and left. I have more respect for people than that thank you very much. To make things worse I come home to find out my oldest and only leopard gecko I have left died. He was impacted and something happened but he bled out. This happened almost a year ago to my other leopard gecko.
One second he has a strong pulse given the circumstances, he's breathing is labored and pushing 30 times a minute. I went to reassess his vitals and check on him. He's not breathing, no pulse, no response to pain. He has a D.N.R. C.C. and a D.N.I.which is a Do Not Resuscitate Comfort Care order. The other D.N.R. you can have is a C.C.A. which is Comfort Care Arrest. The difference is if someone stops breathing and has a C.C.A. then I let them be. If it's non cardiac I have to work on them. He has a comfort care which means I don't perform any interventions. D.N.I. is a do not intubate order.
We got to the hospice center and the R.N. and L.P.N. confirmed he stopped breathing and was gone. That's when it started to sink in. I couldn't take my eyes off of him.
It was hard because his sister asked that I call her if anything happened. I called her when I lost his pulse and told her he was deteriorating and I lost a pulse but got it back. I had to call her once we moved him into the bed to make him look a little more presentable for his family. Before I could say a word she had asked me if he was gone. That's when it got hard and it hit me. He went fast and painless. I know the dose of morphine he was given helped him along but I didn't put that in my run report. Before I left his sister thanked me and said I did everything I could on the way up and she was thankful that I did what work I could on him.
It made for a hard day and my EMS director met us at the door when we pulled back into the station. My partner and I found out the facility staff tried to tell dispatch that we brought the body in and left. He was a D.O.A. and there was nothing we could do you b****. I went into great length on my run report and filled out an incident report. The LPN signed my run report which means I turned care over to them. In this case I simply turned the body over to them. That is what pissed me off.
I feel bad because this is my first death under my care and the hospice staff is trying to say we dumped him and left. I have more respect for people than that thank you very much. To make things worse I come home to find out my oldest and only leopard gecko I have left died. He was impacted and something happened but he bled out. This happened almost a year ago to my other leopard gecko.
