Too Fat to Get Out of the Ambulance

A 56-year-old lady went down on the floor at home and was unable to get up because she had injured her foot. It took eight medics and firefighters to get her out of her home, onto the ambulance and into the emergency department. They transported her on the floor of the ambulance, as they were unable to get her onto an ambulance gurney.

Spine boards were used as ramps to get her from the floor of the ambulance to an emergency department stretcher, which could hardly tolerate the weight. She was incontinent of urine and stool and was so foul smelling she stank up the entire emergency department.

After she was cleaned up and a medical evaluation was performed, she was admitted to the hospital because she was not able to get up and around on her injured foot.

I am not sure what happened to her during her hospitalization but two days later she was back at home and took ill again. This time, she was found unresponsive and the medics tried to keep CPR going while they loaded her, again, onto the floor of the ambulance and brought her to the hospital.

When they got to the emergency department this time, she was still in cardiac arrest. Since it was would have taken too much time to get her into the emergency department, one of my partners went out to the ambulance to try to revive her. His efforts were in vain as he was unable pass a breathing tube or start and IV. She was pronounced dead in the ambulance.