“˜Nightwatch’ Episode 2 Offers Teaching Moments

In Episode 2 of ‘Nightwatch’, paramedic Dan Flynn and EMT Titus Tero respond to a gunshot wound to the thigh and find a young adult male shot close to his groin. There’s a 200-250 CC blood loss. They treat him rapidly and transport him to University Hospital, a nearby trauma center. With humor only EMS crews can appreciate, and usually missed by the public, Dan and Titus joke around as they clean up the patient compartment of their unit, saying how lucky their young patients was because of the big hole he had “next to his junk”.   

In another scene, Holly Monteleone and her partner Gavin Istre respond to what was reported as a possible miscarriage. The incident actually turns out to be a young, pregnant female who is despondent because her boyfriend left her and she is uncertain of her future. She’s very emotional, saying she has “left herself go”.

In what viewers watching both of the series’ first two episodes have learned to be a familiar, friendly greeting from Holly, she attempts to obtain initial information from the young patient, saying, “What’s wrong baby”? After learning the woman’s situation and concerns, Holly works to calm her down and tells her “You are beautiful and you are young and have a lot you can do “¦” After the woman signs off AMA and leaves the ambulance, Holly tells Gavin that she had a good talk with the young woman, stating that it was “woman to woman, paramedic to patient”. To me, this was a key segment and teaching moment for EMS personnel watching the show because it showed Holly’s sincerity and the compassion she has for her patients.

In the third scene of this episode, Dan and Titus respond to the report of a fuel truck on fire. On arrival they find a fully involved fuel tanker that exploded on impact with a passenger car. The fire department requests an extra alarm on the incident. It’s the real deal, with the crew preparing for the worst in the event of another explosion. As fire apparatus are backed up from the escalating, high heat scene as a safety measure, Dan and Titus reposition their ambulance and Dan recites a lesson he was taught, saying to Titus that “You hold your thumb up toward a high hazard and if you can still see it, you’re too close.” It was a lesson I learned from rescue guru Harvey Grant 35 years ago and never forgot. So I was glad that Dan pass along this important scene trick to responders watching the show that had never heard it.
 
Titus also assists the fire department at this horrific scene when a member of the trapped truck driver’s family arrives on scene and wants to know the status of the missing driver. Although Titus knows the man is trapped in the flame consumed wreckage and is reasonably certain that that victim is dead as a result of the conflagration, he comforts the man and assures him at he will report back to him “as soon as there is more information available”. This is an important role that EMS performs that the public rarely sees. So the show gets two thumbs up from me for capturing it.

There was a poignant moment captured at the end of the tanker fire when Dan has to call in the fatality and receive the time of death from a base station physician. The driver was burned beyond recognition in the vehicle. Dan reflects on how hard it is on him and all EMS personnel when confronted with a person who is so tragically killed. This was, again, an important message for viewers to understand the stress and pressure of our job. Having been involved in EMS for some time, this scene made me recall all of the burn patients that I had taken care of in my career. I could almost smell that unmistakable smell of burning flesh that often stays with you for weeks.

However, the most significant thing said during this segment was when Dan, reflecting on the firefighters who had been heavily involved in combating the horrific, fuel-fled vehicle fire, said that it was always good to “see them boys walking around when it’s over”. This symbolized the close relationship that New Orleans EMS has with the New Orleans Fire Department. It was refreshing to see such a strong relationship between the third service EMS agency and their fire department.

The next segment was also very powerful as well with Gavin telling Holly that he was going to be leaving New Orleans EMS to take a position as an offshore paramedic. Holly was shocked and disappointed because she and Gavin had been partners for some time. Gavin tells Holly, after she asks why he had not told her sooner, that he had not told her sooner because he did not want to upset her before her birthday (that day). It was a nice gesture and show of respect for Holly.

Gavin tells Holly that he felt he was burning out and needed the change. She tells Gavin that she understands, particularly because he also stated that he needed to spend more time at home with his family. Holly ends the conversation joking with Gavin that he would be back because he was an “adrenalin junkie” and would get bored away from the busy New Orleans EMS system and return to them.
 
Gavin had served with New Orleans EMS for a significant time and, in fact, had worked the highest amount of overtime with the agency. Although completely committed to his job with New Orleans EMS, this type of long, consistent overtime can wear on any person, particularly when they have a young family at home.

In a segment that highlighted the police activity during the night shift in New Orleans’ rough Sixth District, the police are patrolling in the area and suddenly hear gunfire directed in their attention and see muzzle flashes. Shouting “94” (the illegal use of a weapon), the police vault from their vehicle and begin to swarm the scene for few a few minutes in the episode. They finally bring in a K-9 dog who rapidly locates the suspect under a house, and they subsequently retrieve a weapon nearby.

Another significant moment in episode 2 occurred when Titus and Dan also discussed Gavin leaving the job and wondered if it was because of money. Titus points out that “you can’t do this job for the money man – you gotta do this job for the love”. This is a great moment in the episode because it shows the dedication and investment EMS personnel have for a job that rarely pays them then the amount of money that it should.

After this scene, Dan and Titus are shown inside a fire station where they talk with the station’s crew about the tanker incident. This once again shows that a great rapport between fire and EMS, something that should occur more often in more systems.

Another key section followed, with Titus discussing how hard it was to be on the street and in paramedic class at the same time. Countless EMTs go through the same evolution as they attend school, study and strive to make a living to advance to the paramedic level.  Dan notes that he had forgotten how difficult it was until Titus spoke about it. This shows the public the extreme sacrifice that EMTs make to not only work and endure the stress involved in the EMS but to also advance to another level in their career.

The final segment of episode 2 was my favorite, when Holly and Gavin, at the end of his final shift with New Orleans EMS sat on the rear step of Ambulance 3232, chatting about his last night with her as her partner and Gavin saying that he was going to miss working for New Orleans EMS.

It was a poignant moment by itself, but took on more significance when they suddenly hear an ambulance coming in the distance responding Code 3 to a call and, in what might be a missed message to the general public but not EMS responders, Holly tells Gavin that Dan and Titus took the call so that she and Gavin could “get off work on time”. This again is a great message and tribute to EMS personnel that are considerate of their coworkers and do what they can to make sure that they can finish their shift on time to be able to head home to their families.

The concluding segment of Episode 2 shows Dan and Holly washing their unit at the end of the shift and reflecting on their time together as partners. This segment made me reflect on the many partners I have had in my career and the countless units that I and my partners washed to make sure that they were not only clean for the patients, but also to keep their large “billboard” spotless as they pass by the citizens that they serve.

It also made me reflect on many of the partners that I had served with throughout my career and made me realize how true Holly’s words were about the significance of having a partner that you know and trust and can almost predict their next move before they do it.

This was a great episode because it showed the public, as well as new EMTs and paramedics, how significant the working relationship between long-term partners is and how important it is to try and maintain those relationships because they can reduce the stress in the job and assist during critical cases.

This episode, although only the second in the series, continued to impress me with not just the show and its action-packed content, but also the way in which the production company captured key moments and edited in the proper segments to get important messages across.
 
Although some may be critical of this show because it is raw in content as well as language, the show, to me, is a representation of what goes on inside the cab and patient compartment of ambulances all throughout the world. It’s not the kind of show that I would feel most appropriate for ABC, CBS and NBC where young children often hang out, it is still, in my opinion, a great look at our unpredictable EMS “adventures”, the kind of the stress that’s involved in our job, and the camaraderie that can and should occur between police, fire and EMS.

I also continue to be impressed with the crews that have been selected to be shown on this series. In an interview posted on the A&E website (www.aetv.com/nightwatch), Holly, when asked what she hopes people will get out of the show, summed it up perfectly saying: “I want people to realize that we exist. We are human beings. We give you 12-hour shifts, our holidays, our kids’ birthdays, and our anniversaries. People don’t stop dying just because it’s Christmas. And people think we are just ambulance drivers. We are an essential part in the health care system that no one thinks about, or everyone forgets. We treat people and in some cases we are the defining factor between life and death. We exist and we’d like you to know us.”

Watch ‘Nightwatch’ this Thursday when the New Orleans crews respond to a police officer who is shot. It should be another powerful, emotion-packed episode.

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