Life & Safety with Jimmy Rios
Welcome to Life & Safety with Jimmy Rios! Get ready to dive into a world where safety meets storytelling! Drawing from his rich background as a former firefighter, EMT and safety expert, Jimmy brings you straight into the heart of safety and emergency preparedness. Episodes feature easy-to-understand tips, real-life stories, and interviews with experts, all designed to help you protect yourself, your business, and those you care about.
Whether it's advice on navigating everyday safety challenges or insights into the latest in health and safety trends, let this podcast educate and entertain you. Join Jimmy and level-up your safety knowledge with engaging discussions that could one day save a life.
Life & Safety with Jimmy Rios
Game Time Decisions: When to Dial 911
Welcome to Part 1 of our 3-Part 911 series! Have you ever been in a situation that left you second-guessing whether it was dire enough to dial 911? Well, buckle up and let Jimmy and Megan take you on a whirlwind tour of those critical moments where calling emergency services isn't just a good idea, it's a potential lifesaver. In this episode, we navigate the tricky waters of emergency scenarios—unconscious individuals, severe injuries, and the need for urgent interventions. We'll even chat about EpiPens and Narcan with a sprinkle of our usual humor. Join us as we crack the code on the indispensable role of dispatchers, who are the unsung heroes ready to guide you through crisis management step by step.
Laughter ensues as we tackle the do's and don'ts of emergency response, including why a sprint to the firehouse might not be in your best interest. We share tales from the front lines of safety and sprinkle in personal anecdotes that bring home the reality of these high-stakes situations. Join us for an episode that's equal parts educational and entertaining, ensuring you walk away with the confidence to make that all-important call to 911 when it really matters.
Life Safety Associates specializes in emergency response training for corporate ERT Teams. We help businesses create competent and confident first responders who are ready to handle unexpected emergencies. For more information you find us @lifesafetyassoc or email@lifesafety.com.
So we have our next podcast when to call 911.
Jimmy:When to call 911. First off, what's happening? It's your boy, jimmy, with the Life and Safety podcast With Megs, as usual. Yeah, like Megan said, it's the next podcast in our line and it's when to call 911. It's a tricky question. We get asked that a lot and I guess I'm going to flip it back on Megan and ask her when she calls 911 and when she tells people in class when to call 911. And what she tells people in class when they call 911. So, like in classes we go, you know, we're always constantly holding classes for life safety. We're very blessed that way. And the biggest question, especially when we're in offices what happens with my coworker? I feel like something's bad and my coworker's embarrassed and I'm embarrassed. Should I call 911? I'll ask. I'm embarrassed. Should I call 911? I'll ask it that way Should I call 911? Or when should I call 911? Or anything like that.
Megan:So I'll let Megan answer that and then I'll add to it. I guess the easiest answer is when in doubt, call 911. It's not going to hurt to call 911. It's better to call them out and have them be like, yeah, we don't need to be here then to have there be an emergency and not have the help they need. But you know, if you get a paper cut, I'm not going to expect you to call 911 for that. But a broken bone, even if you think you might be having a heart attack like I don't know, my chest feels kind of funny, I'm worried. Might as well call 911 or get to the hospital you want.
Jimmy:It's better to be overly cautious and get checked out. Yeah, I would just kind of piggyback on that a little bit. And if anytime you feel uncomfortable responding or helping somebody and you're like man, this is a little over my head or I'm not really sure call up, call 911. You know, get a higher level trained person there and let them make that decision and that's their job. They're not going to fine you for that. So the fire department will fine you if you have false alarms, like your fire alarm's going off constantly, things like that. But if you genuinely think somebody's having a heart attack or a stroke or something along those lines and you call 911 and the fire department shows up a bunch of times, they're not going to charge you and the ambulance only charges you if they transport you. So if those of you that are old enough to remember the taxi cabs right when they dropped the flag and they started the meter, same kind of thing with the ambulance is when they shut those doors, that's when the meter starts. So don't worry about calling 911. It's always, always, always call 911 when in doubt.
Jimmy:Now one of the things we'll talk about when to call 911, and then we'll talk. I'll tell you a quick story about me and Mrs Life Safety. Jenny called 911 a couple months ago for a fire. So, megan, what were your absolutes? You should always call 9-1-1 for.
Megan:Like, give me one or two. I mean, if there's an unconscious patient, that's an immediate call to 9-1-1. If there's, like you said, if there's something where you're like I don't know how to handle this, um, whether that be, you know somebody's choking and you're like I remember I'm supposed to do something, but I don't know what it is, call 9-1-1. Dispatchers are trained to talk you through an emergency. So if you for if you've taken a first aid or a CPR class before and you're like I don't remember what I was taught, if you can remember to call 911, they can talk you through how to do it. They'll say you know, oh, is the person breathing? Check your breathing. Oh, if they're not breathing, okay, place one hand in the center of the chest, place your other hand on top of that and press to this beat. They'll help you talk you through that they'll help you talk you through that.
Jimmy:Yeah, good point. Now some absolutes for me. If you see bones sticking out of the skin, call 911.
Megan:That's a good one. That's a good one, right fair.
Jimmy:If somebody's having just difficulty breathing they can't catch their breath. You don't know if it's a panic attack, heart attack, what's going on? Call 911. If you see somebody fall from an extended ladder or the top of a ladder, call 911.
Megan:If you have to perform some sort of emergency maneuver, like if you have to inject them with their EpiPen or you have to give somebody Narcan, even if they wake up, that's still a call to 911.
Jimmy:Yeah, absolutely good points, Absolutely good points. Now, this calling 911 is going to be a three-part, and so make sure you tune in to the next two episodes to kind of hear, like, what's going on. This is when we call 911. We'll talk about what happens when 911 gets there and then we're going to talk about what happens afterwards. But a really important thing when you call 911, especially in a car accident or you see a fire on the side of the road, you should stop.
Megan:Yeah.
Jimmy:You should stop so you can give directions. Jenny and I were driving home a couple months ago at night I never remember where we were coming from and there was a pretty good fire. I saw a flare up and it looked like somebody poured something on it or it got into a bush like a dry bush and flared up and it was pretty big and started burning down like a wooden fence on the side of the road and I said I don't see any services. We should probably call 911. And I kept driving, so we called 911. We should probably call 911. And I kept driving. So we call 911. It comes over the.
Jimmy:Bluetooth and I'm explaining to them what I saw and where we were at. And she's like well, where was it exactly? And at this point I'm a mile down the road plus a couple stoplights and I was like I'm traveling this, it was between this area and this area, that's all I have. We left and they're like well, do you see anybody? Is there anybody burnt, is there anybody injured? And I was like I don't know. We saw it, drove down it and we called for help. So even professionals right, we make mistakes and so try to stay there. If it's safe for you to pull over on the side of the road or something like that, stay there so you can make sure you can navigate people to get there. And when they get there, we'll talk about that. But it's much easier to navigate people to get to your emergency if you're there. And you're not trying to recite it from memory.
Megan:And they might ask, for, like you said, there's questions that they'll ask and you might not be able to answer them if you're not there.
Jimmy:Yeah, like, where is it exactly? I don't know, it's on the side of the road.
Megan:And if we're talking about like a medical emergency, it might be well. What does the person look like? Are they breathing right now? You know, is there? What are they asking about right now? You know anything.
Jimmy:Don't die, nah definitely not going to die. Don't need to call 911 right now, just allergies getting me a little bit Well, well.
Megan:All righty, I have two more questions for you.
Jimmy:Shoot.
Megan:So what if you think that this person needs to go to the hospital or they need emergency care and you want to call 911 for them, but they say no, no, no, I don't want to go, no.
Jimmy:Yeah, most people don't want to go because it's embarrassing and it's expensive. Don't want to go because it's embarrassing and it's expensive, but I tell people in my class to always call 9-1-1, regardless if you've. You know, trust your instincts, you know. If you feel like it's it's it's a 9-1-1 issue, it's an emergency for you, call 9-1-1. Yeah, they can always, always, always decline treatment. It's called against medical advice waiver. I think we're going to talk about that in the third one, probably a little bit more. But definitely, definitely call 911. If you have that inkling, trust your spidey senses. If you're tingling, you need to call 911, call 911. I'd rather the person be embarrassed and mad at me that we called 911 than have them die. I'd definitely sleep better if the person was mad at me. So, yeah, that's what I would say to that.
Megan:And then what if this person is insistent, they say I don't want 911 called, can you just drive me to the hospital?
Jimmy:Yeah, that's another good question, a common question we get.
Jimmy:If you live in the Bay Area, you know there's not the best drivers in the Bay Area and if you're panicked and you're driving without lights and sirens and people getting out of your way, it's going to be worse.
Jimmy:So it's always seen safety, your safety, is always, always, always first. And if you're driving down the road and you're stressed out because the person next to you is throwing up blood or cannot breathe really well or insert scary situation, you're not going to drive well and you're going to put yourself and everybody else in danger, at risk. So call 911, call 911, call 911, right, I mean, if the emergency room is across the street, like actually across the street, maybe drive that person across the street. If they're a block away and you have to make a turn, call 911. Don't drive to the firehouse either. Don't pull into a firehouse and start honking your horn because they may not be there, they might not be on another call, or they're grocery shopping or who knows what's going on in their lives. It's just like dropping in on your friend. It's not always the best thing to do.
Jimmy:It's nice, but it's not always the best thing to do. That's what I would say Always call 911. Always call 911. Yeah, yeah.
Megan:I guess the answer to when do I call 911 is whenever you think.
Jimmy:Whenever you think your spidey senses you feel like it's needed, call 911.
Megan:All righty. Oh, I thought that was the third question?
Jimmy:Was that the third question? Mm-hmm Dang, my sinus medicine is kicking in. I can't even count to three right now. Thank you all for joining us in the Life and Safety Podcast, peace.
