I had some trepidation about taking an Anti-Black Racism course (which was offered free to employees at our hospital, and all students, faculty and staff affiliated with the University of Connecticut) but I was enthused to engage and learn so I could better understand what is going in America and how I could better help […]

I follow COVID ACTNOW daily for a look at how the epidemic is progressing or retreating.  It looks now like it is advancing so severely that they have had to add a new color/category risk level to their map.  Previously red was the worse you could do and it signaled critical – “Active or Imminent […]

It’s Black Friday.  When thinking of Christmas gifts, consider supporting EMS authors. My new book, Killing Season: A Paramedic’s Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Opioid Epidemic,   is coming out on April 6, 2021, but if you order two books (or spend $50 now, you can get them for 40% off under a special promotion.  […]

This week I received in the mail special glasses I ordered from the back of an old comic book.  They enable me to see COVID.  He is a tiny little green monster with a coat of suction cups.  He is not just one fellow, but an army of millions of little green monsters. I sit […]

Adamis pharmaceuticals is seeking FDA approval for ZIMHI™(naloxone) Injection, a 5 (FIVE) milligram intramuscular (IM) dose of naloxone for use in suspected opioid overdose. https://www.adamispharmaceuticals.com/zimhi-naloxone/ In EMS, we try to titrate naloxone to the smallest possible amount to reduce respiratory depression.  We have that luxury because we carry bag valve masks, which enable us to […]

Twenty-seven years ago, in a retaliatory shooting, a man in Hartford’s north end opened fire with an automatic weapon, killing his target.  He was sentenced to fifty years in prison.  He left at home a baby daughter. *** I get called for the unconscious.  I arrive first and climb windy wooden stairs to the third […]

Every morning when I report to work, I check my gear,  my heart monitor, my medic bag, and the blood cooler.  Our service has been carrying whole blood stored in a paramedic response vehicle for a couple months now, and none too soon.   In the midst of two serious epidemics — COVID-19 and the opioid […]

When I woke up Friday morning and checked my phone, there was a notification asking me to join Connecticut’s new COVID-19 contact tracking app.  I installed it right away.  The app tracks my proximity to other people using the app.  If I test positive, a contact tracer will ask if I will share my close […]