Completed: 1/29/2023
Recommendation: Mild Recommendation
Recommended By: I cannot remember
Review:
This book did not really help me understand my youngest's work any better. I've been on ride-alongs and I had a sense of what it was like, but this book did not enrich that. Instead, it provided a perspective on how ambulances fit in the multi-tiered safety net that the United States has tried to create. This was eye opening to me as I haven't really pursued a study of how the safety net is "designed." Recognizing that safety net leverages existing functionality as much as possible, the ambulance does have an odd role. I know from my youngest's experience that in our county an ambulance has a lot less proactive capabilities then I had assigned it. Back in the old days, an ambulance could do more, but those roles have been restricted to people with higher training (not just EMTs, but paramedics). I'm sure that there is a good reason for this. In addition, there are now tiers of ambulances (Basic Life Service vs. Advanced Life Service vs. Critical Care) that offer progressively more services.
So, this book does help explain some of the actions of ambulance crews as a response to their environment. It also helps explain the fee for service model of modern ambulance crews which is new to me (I simply did not know it existed). This puts a new pressure on ambulance crews to be making money which may explain faster dispatch to more wealthy areas, although that is only obliquely addressed in this book. All-in-all, this was a worthwhile read, but not what I had expected.
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