Oh God....where to start.
As a paramedic of several years' standing (and surprisingly few interactions with Them Upstairs) I have, naturlich, a few anecdotes to share, and I have on many occasions in the pages of this 'ere website. If boredom takes you, you can have a look.

On one hand, the job is excellent: every day is different, you meet different people and help them, and even if all you are doing is (medically) little or nothing, the general public are (as a rule) grateful for what we do for them. And occasionally, when you do get someone who is extremely broken, and you fix them (or at least unbreak them a bit) then that is what makes the job worthwhile.

What some people describe as the negatives (bodily fluids, night shifts, crawling under upside down cars, long hours etc.) are part of what make the job what it is. As a general rule with us and certainly the police, it's a Marmite career.

The things that I hate? Well...it's seeing a feckless, disingenuous bunch of smegma-ridden bastards covered in twatty sauce (can you guess who?) try and destroy a service that keeps people alive. It's sitting outside an A&E department at 3 in the morning with a little old granny who you can't offload because they have no beds. It's dealing with GPs who are often at the best clinically unskilled, at the worst downright maliciously negligent (not all of them, not even most, but in terms of workload, a significant majority). It's being assaulted by some micropenised steroid injected fuckstain who is so off his gourd on ketamine that he thinks the world is his punchbag, but knowing that reporting it is a massive waste of time.

The job's great; the system's fucked.

TL:DR Whiney whiney whine.....
( Undercovercarrot got done for gross misconduct on..., Sat 18 May 2013, 18:53, 20 replies)

Nice to see you back UCC

(Brigadier an old boot sitting on a man's face - forever, Sat 18 May 2013, 18:56, closed)

in a job like that
if you don't whine occasionally, you'll go mad
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Sat 18 May 2013, 18:58, closed)

I think ... and I'm going out on a limb here ... but I reckon
that if anybody begrudges you an occasional whine when you're doing a job that is critical to a decent society - and against a tide of reactionary political fuckwittery - then we should take them outside with a couple of stout branches and turn them into potential customers.
( Dr. Shambolic je suis charlie, Sat 18 May 2013, 19:19, closed)

drunk tanks
With the current overloading of a+e I think its high time we brought back drunk tanks where certain people just got put to wait until it was quieter, regardless of injuries. If you choose to put yourself in a situation (I.e. paralytic) where you are likely to get both hurt and aggressive, then why should people who make more sensible choices have to wait for you?
(Smegma, Sat 18 May 2013, 21:22, closed)

occasionally, it's not entirely their fault
i once had a few drinks with a bloke. didn't know that what he was giving me was homebrew whisky, pure hooch. after 4 drinks, i ended up in hospital with alcohol poisoning. i didn't touch booze for 2 years and i've never drunk anything from an unmarked bottle since, but i might have died without the help of the A&E staff. naive, maybe, but not entirely my fault.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Sat 18 May 2013, 21:30, closed)

Yes.
That would certainly be a progressive and civilised way to deal with the serious issue of alcohol dependence. You are clearly an informed and thoughtful person and in no way a pointless fuckwit.
( Dr. Shambolic je suis charlie, Sat 18 May 2013, 22:12, closed)

I agree. I for one believe we should go further and make alcohol completely illegal.
Some capitalist dissidents who support oil companies and big pharma might argue that the last large-scale attempt to try this was a complete disaster (the USA during the 1920s), but they're enemies of progress and should be shouted into silence and have all their works discredited in trials by media.
( The Mock TurtIe ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Sun 19 May 2013, 0:33, closed)

Yeah, but don't forget the fat people

(woocfot friends with Sacha Distel, Sun 19 May 2013, 1:19, closed)

This right here
"The job's great; the system's fucked"

That's it. That's the NHS in a nutshell.
( naked_ravens A big hammer, WD40 & gaffer tape, Sat 18 May 2013, 21:59, closed)

Yep. Absolutely true.

( da5id <YOUR SIG HERE>, Sun 19 May 2013, 16:48, closed)

What's the difference between "most" and "a significant majority"?
'Cos I'm finding it hard to see how a significant majority can not be most. Did you mean a significant minority?

Have to agree with you in that case. But what can you expect when you consider how doctors are selected and trained?
(ubergeekian, Sun 19 May 2013, 0:11, closed)

If its any consolation
I really appreciated it when the paramedics picked me up from the bottom of the stairs I had just fallen down and after hitting the wall at the bottom was rendered somewhat unconscious. Dont remember much more except waking up in a touch of pain in a hospital but it was the paramedics who got me there :)
(gearanach #wankwankwank, Sun 19 May 2013, 16:52, closed)