Kentucky EMS team under fire for treating man with antivenom

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Originally Posted by Bogertophis

Policy makers need more schooling...

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At least here in WI, (some state) EMS policy makers are MDs, and county/local EMS medical directors are too, often with additional credentials in prehospital or wilderness care (my wife is one). Not sure how much more schooling in medicine one can get.

EMS workers are trained to administer the drugs/procedures they're authorized to administer, and are trained to recognize and address possible adverse effects of those specific interventions. They don't have much broad medical knowledge. Hospital medical staff (what kind? Do they have prehospital EMS training? Sounds like contacting them wasn't part of the legitimate chain of contact; if it was it shouldn't have been an issue) may or may not know the details of the situation/treatment. If the EMS personnel gave him the antivenom and he would have died or been disabled, they would have likely been charged. They're extremely lucky nothing went wrong.

The state seems to have been absolutely right to have a hearing. EMS isn't just good people making it up as they go.