What goes through a medic’s mind?

Ginger Locke is infatuated with the minds of medics.

She is a paramedic educator, researcher, author, blogger, and social media maven (please see awesome memes below). She has recently transformed her written word blog into a multimedia paradise featuring her new podcast, Medic Mindset, where she interviews medics delving into what makes them tick. She was inspired by her medic students questions as they became newly minted medics and wanted to help others know what to expect from their profession by interviewing working medics that share their honest perceptions and experiences. Clinical, operational, and personal topics are all present. Click above to access her blog and listen for yourself.

The most recent episode features Fiona Thomas from The Code Green Campaign. The Code Green Campaign provides awareness of EMS provider mental health and suicide via shared stories, collects anonymous reports to track EMS suicides (in concert with Firefighter Behavioral Health Alliance), and provides education for the EMS community. Their site also has a section with mental health providers and programs that specialize in treating first responders.

Fiona shares the origins of Code Green, personal inspirations, and her ever changing career evolution. She also shares her clinical experiences as a paramedic, what challenges her clinically, and how she personally deals with stress and mitigating the effects of work. She also has some interesting non-EMS related jobs.

She discusses the cathartic effect journaling produces for her and it’s role in helping her release stress. Fiona pulls from her non-EMS life experience, sharing that “words matter,” not just the written word, but the actions our verbiage denotes and images they inspire and communicate.

Fiona gives some sage advice to her younger self (and the rest of us) to “just stick it out.” As EMS providers, and perhaps my personal experiences, we tend to give up when things get hard (professional or personal).

She continues by advising us to “listen to your patient.” We all know patients will tell you when they are going to die, vomit, or have a baby. But, what about the patients who aren’t in the throes of an emergency- listen to their stories or what they are telling you they need, even if it’s not in your clinical arsenal

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I’m not going to spoil the ENTIRE episode for you – you’ll have to listen yourself!

If you aspire to be a student of the profession and stay abreast of current topics in EMS, make it your business to follow Ginger and Medic Mindset.