High but not mighty.

“Recreational drugs – relating to or denoting drugs taken on an occasional basis for enjoyment”

Above is a definition given when one searches the word “recreational” in a famous search engine. My experiences were very different. None of the users I was called to were occasional users, none of them were particularly enjoying life.

Having never used non-prescribed drugs, I can’t talk about the feelings they give the user, having deemed life extinct as a result of their use more than once, I can talk about the feelings they caused in me. Anger, despair, sadness…the list goes on.

I will never understand why someone feels the need to use drugs to “enhance” their lives, knowing the addictive properties and the devastation they cause, but they do.

I’ve mentioned Narcan/Naloxone before in a previous post, a drug ambulance crews carry that blocks the effect of opioids (heroin etc),for a short time. Time enough for the patient to recover rapidly and realise that the hit they needed, that they’d paid for, had been removed. This was often met with anger and, with it, violence. It also meant that, if the patient had taken a significant amount of their chosen drug (generally the case in an overdose situation), the effect of Narcan would not last as long as the effect of the overdose. The use of this life saving drug relied on the ambulance arriving ,and the drug being administered, in plenty of time. More than one person asked me during my career – did I ever think of taking a little bit longer to get to jobs, thus allowing the drug user pass away and easing the burden of drug users on society. My answer was, and always will be, a very definite no! My job was never to play God. No ambulance crew member anywhere has the right to decide who lives and who dies, their job is, unquestionably, to preserve life. Millionaire in a mansion or homeless in a cardboard box, the level of care is the same in the back of an ambulance.

The job came on our screen as a drug overdose in one of the “less salubrious” parts of town. We rushed over and arrived at the same time as one of the single crewed fast response cars. All three of us ran into the building and up to the correct flat. We were met at the door by a strangely cheery person with a needled syringe behind their ear. Needles are always a concern to crews in drug-related incidents, but this person assured us they would deal with it correctly and guided us through to their friend. The patient was unresponsive and breathing worryingly slowly, but their heart was still beating. My partner got to work with the bag and mask, a way of pushing pure oxygen into the patient’s lungs and ensuring that oxygen was fed to their vital organs (assuming their heart was still working) , while I began preparing the Naloxone injection. The third crew member began inserting a tube (known as a cannula) directly into a vein in the patient’s arm. I injected an amount into the drug directly into the patient’s arm, just below the shoulder. This would not work as quickly as if it was injected directly into their bloodstream, but at least it would have some effect before the cannula was in place. Once the paramedic had the cannula inserted I inserted a further dose straight into the patient’s bloodstream. The effect was almost instantaneous, but we had all anticipated this and had stepped away far enough to be at a safe distance when the patient came round and realised what had happened.. Once they had calmed down and we had explained what happened, the patient refused transport to hospital, so we filled in the relevant paperwork and left. As we walked back to the vehicles the fast response car driver suddenly shouted “SH*T!!”, and ran back to the flat. It transpired he had left the cannula in the patient’s arm, a drug user’s dream – direct access to a vein!

Drug related deaths always seemed so pointless, a waste. They also had their own hazards, as I’ve already mentioned, needles. One job we were called to, My partner was about to kneel beside the patient, just as I caught a flash of an uncovered needle on the floor, right where my partner was about to put their knee! then there are the patients who become suddenly extremely violent and threaten crew members with whatever comes to hand – needles, kitchen knives…. Often you don’t feel fear in the situation, but it comes afterwards when the reality of the potential outcomes hit you.

Legal highs are becoming more and more popular. They are available from corner shops everywhere, the owners happy to cash in on legalised drug dealing, not giving a thought to the harm they are causing. Many times I was called to patients who were having bad trips, or who felt like their hearts were trying to leave their bodies. When asked if they knew what they were taking, not one of them did. They all seemed surprised that some unknown drug was affecting their body in unexpected ways, thus was the rationale of the drug user.

There have been campaigns telling us the perils of drug use for decades, but there are still people who think it will be different for them. There is no convincing some people, even some who have lost friends though drug abuse, such is the grip addiction has. Ambulance crews across the country will continue to take their abuse, and will continue to put themselves at risk to try to save people who have no respect for their own, or anyone else’s life. Ambulance Service management will continue to tell crews they will never put them at risk, that they should always put their safety first……….but the same managers will still expect their ambulance crews to go to these jobs on a regular basis, because targets must be met…..