83 | Is medicine your entire personality? | Get off on time | Burnout | Compassion fatigue | A physicians personal experience with the ER

Practical EMS

Don’t make your career your entire personality, extra shifts will affect you over time. Sometimes the extra money is not worth the burnout

The culture is shifting from working a ton to a better work life balance

Your family will remember that extra shift you worked far longer than your employer

Get off on time

Control the variables you can control that give you higher chance of getting off on time

Leave work at work

Burnout can be short term or long term, acute or chronic

If you cannot take care of yourself, you cannot take care of others well

Strive to live a healthy lifestyle

Don’t let your relationships falter because you are too busy

Don’t take those patients that are terrible to you personally. We are seeing patients on the worst day of their lives

The environment we work in is one of the most challenging out there

Learn what burnout looks like for you individually

Schedule time to relax and spend time with friends

Have a system for overcoming burnout, maybe therapy, maybe exercise

You have to manage and recognize compassion fatigue to avoid taking out your stress on other people that don’t deserve it

Don’t wear things as a badge of honor that are not good things: like not drinking water all shift

Avoid the bad habits that allow a short-term benefit for a long-term detriment

Selflessness is a big part of who we are, but this can be a point of damage if you don’t take care of yourself

Understand that we are all working as a team. You have to understand your role and work efficiently within that role

Lucas talks about a very personal experience with EMS, law enforcement and the ER. He realized that anyone of these people could have been the last to see his son alive. And we are that for other people many times. We are a tribe.

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Full show notes can be found here: Episodes - Practical EMS - Content for EMTs, PAs, Paramedics
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Everything you hear today from myself and my guests is opinion only and doesn’t represent any organizations or companies that any of us are affiliated with. The stories you hear have been modified to protect patient privacy and any resemblance to real individuals is coincidental. This is for educational and entertainment purposes only and should not be taken as medical advice nor used to diagnose any medical or healthcare conditions.