The University Diaries

I made it ten months frontline before I caught coronavirus. I had also just had the first dose of my vaccine. I want to complain about how annoying that is but I am trying really hard to be grateful. I am trying my absolute hardest not to whine (shoutout to my instagram followers who have already listened to me whine).  Here are the events leading up to, during and after my coronavirus experience. C - 7 days It is my second and final shift of two days at work before a long weekend off. I'm working with a lovely paramedic who I have worked with a few times recently, she has just come back from work after having coronavirus over Christmas. She says she was not too unwell, just a little bit grotty and she enjoyed having Christmas off and an excuse not to do too much. She said she was really lucky that she was not too unwell. Our first job (out of area) but the village I used to live in. A fall with a head injury, the patient was on anticoagulants also was consistently complaining of c...

Here is my story documenting from my last submission of my degree into becoming a baby paramedic. This series will include getting my degree, trust and local area inductions, driver training and more! It has been covid-fied (as expected) but not too much has changed, as the ambulance service has had to keep running pretty much the same throughout the pandemic. Generic Admin Stuff At half nine on Monday morning I went into station for my local area induction with another girl who was on my trust induction and who I went to uni with. We went and sat in the new covid-fied station (distanced chairs and lots of signs and info sheets on the walls) and waited for the LOM (locality operations manager? I think? AKA a manager) to come and get us. After we sorted a coffee, we went into one of the meeting rooms so start our induction. We went through the normal induction stuff, which includes stations and contact numbers within the area, how to report sickness, accessing rostered shifts and submit...

Here is my story documenting from my last submission of my degree into becoming a baby paramedic. This series will include getting my degree, trust and local area inductions, driver training and more! It has been covid-fied (as expected) but not too much has changed, as the ambulance service has had to keep running pretty much the same throughout the pandemic. I left you last time at the end of week one. I drove home and had a weekend where I chilled and revised my advanced life support. On the Sunday night I drove up to the hotel (and paid for an extra night) so I could have a relaxed start to the week. First thing Monday morning we discussed trust pathways, including primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PPCI) and hyper-acute stroke unit (HASU), along with referral pathways including falls and vulnerable adult and child referrals. In the afternoon we had managers from local stations, who were able to discuss the NQP two year transition pathway. In all honesty, it sounded a bit ...

Here is my story documenting from my last submission of my degree into becoming a baby paramedic. This series will include getting my degree, trust and local area inductions, driver training and more! It has been covid-fied (as expected) but not too much has changed, as the ambulance service has had to keep running pretty much the same throughout the pandemic. Accommodation Logistics On the 18th September the trust contacted me to tell me they were happy to take me on the induction even though I did not have my ratified results. This gave me approximately four hours to sort accommodation before the already-hard-to-get-hold-of recruitment staff went home for the weekend. Fortunately I managed to find a couple of people who I knew who were also on the course (thank you group chats!) and we all agreed to stay in the same Premier Inn which was approx 10 mins drive from the training centre. We were given three options for accommodation and travel (this will vary trust to trust but will like...

Here is my story documenting from my last submission of my degree into becoming a baby paramedic. This series will include getting my degree, trust and local area inductions, driver training and more! It has been covid-fied (as expected) but not too much has changed, as the ambulance service has had to keep running pretty much the same throughout the pandemic. My final deadlines were my dissertation and an essay for my leadership and management module, the 24th and 31st July respectively. These were long essays and took me months to complete, so once they were finished I had no idea what to do with myself! I worked three to four days a week and enjoyed a small reduction in covid restrictions. We were saving really hard to buy our first house, so being able to work for a couple of months was helpful for finances. I still found it really difficult as I had never had this much spare time, as I have always had work and education to contend with and once this stopped it was quite difficult ...

Here is a brutally honest review of my first day on the road as an NQP (not third manning). I definitely was not expecting it to start off how it did, but the day still went well. Enjoy! 5am - Alarm went off. Early mornings are not too bad for me anymore, I had got very used to getting up at 4.15am for my 6am starts and hour commute so 5am basically feels like a lie-in nowadays. I got up, got dressed, kitted my pockets with the masses of stuff I hold in my pockets and put the kettle on. I made mine and my boyfriends breakfast, packing mine in my bag (yogurt, fruit and oats) and sipped my tea. I retreated upstairs to put on some make-up, brush my hair and teeth and pack my bag.  6am - Left for work, very nervous. Since I found out I was on this shift I had been nervous in case I was working with someone entirely unqualified that I could not bat ideas off. I tried to calm my nerves with some music on my 45 minute drive to station. 6.45am - Arrived at my station. I really like this sa...

Here is another post about the questions I get the most from my Instagram! I really appreciate all of your interactions and love our student paramedic community. Thank you for your continued support. On with the questions! What is your name? My name is Danii, short for Daniiella (and no - I did not spell it wrong... My parents blessed me with a uniquely spelt name which was definitely character building as a child!). Why did you choose this route? I am not sure if I have told my story about wanting to be a paramedic before, but anyway it is not that interesting. As a child I always loved science, especially medicine. I was the weird kid that would read all the health leaflets found in random places from smoking and cancers to meningitis and malaria (and freak myself out sometimes too). I was fascinated with different illnesses. My parents were both in the police force, with specialities, so I grew up with them working erratic shifts with lots of days on and a few days off. They m...

As a student paramedic, I cannot say that I get much time to watch television. In the evening when I do get a chance, I'm normally snoozing on the sofa within 30 seconds anyway, to be woken up by the end credits before taking myself to bed. Here are the shows that I often find myself watching or coming back to when I have the time. I generally use my lunch break, when I am at home, to watch half or a whole show, as a bit of a wind down from doing work. Ski A&E - Sky (originally W) (maybe YouTube)? I am a skiing bum (if you did not know) so of course I love Ski A&E! It is interesting to see how they rescue on the slopes and how their medical centres run with a large number of patients coming in. It shows a mixture of tourists being unlucky and/or stupid and other problems. I would definitely recommend this show, especially if you ski better than you walk (like me)! Losing it: Our Mental Health Emergency - Channel 4 This is a four part documentary about a mental heal...

Hello, just a pre-word, if you are not the kind of person interested in earning a passive income/rewards, this is not the post for you, and I would suggest you come back next week for another student paramedic post. This, however, is SUCH a game-changer, especially if you are using your laptop for looking at research, journal articles etc (at a minimum). So, if you are interested in earning free gift vouchers, PS4/Xbox/PS classic games, electronic gadgets/apps or donating to charity - this is the app for you! What is it and how does it work? I've been using Gener8   for the past few months and I'm hoping this platform continues to grow because I already love it so much! Basically, Gener8 is an extension from chrome/moxilla which swaps the ads you see for their own ads (which you can customise to what you are in interested in by a short quiz) and every time you see them they award you with tokens. I also use the new tab extension too which earns me extra tokens! It currentl...

I am back with another hospital placement review! I am a third year student now and we have to do five weeks of out-of-ambulance placement this year, which includes paediatrics! I was placed in the children's assessment unit at my local hospital, here is what I saw, found and learnt! Background I contacted my placement provider two or three months before I was due to start placement, about a month in advance, the lady who is the student coordinator sent me the dates that she was working that week so that I would definitely be placed with her. She gave me Monday, Wednesday and Saturday which was a little odd as I am used to working consecutive days, however it was actually really helpful as on those days off I was able to work and catch up on life things (and sleep as I had just come off Scout camp and was completely exhausted). I arranged for my boyfriend to take me in on his way to work because hospital parking is always a total nightmare for staff, and really expensive for pat...

I am a third (and final) year Paramedic Science student who helps at interview days and (back in the day) attended five interview days and got five offers! Here are examples of what you *might* be asked during your Paramedic Science interview. Sorry if none of these come up, please let me know what you get asked so we can give the future generation an idea of what to expect! These questions apply to MMIs (multiple mini interviews), individual and group interviews and also written literacy tests. Generic Questions - What is your perception of the role of a paramedic? - How is it best to deal with conflict (between crew mates/supervisors/managers etc)? - What is something that is currently affecting the profession (anything recent in the news)? - What is professionalism? - What is teamwork? - What do you understand about patient confidentiality? - How would you deal with difficult patients/angry relatives? - What areas do you know of that paramedics work in/how is the ambulance...

I am a third year Paramedic Science student, stuff has never felt more real than being in the year that I *should* graduate in. I am terrified. Let's jump in to what I want to achieve this year (which might give you some Pass my degree In all honesty, I have got to the point (that I'm sure most people get to during their Paramedic Science degree) where I just want to pass my degree, I will take any grade that will make me a paramedic this year. Dramatic but desperately true. Feel confident going into my OSCE It seems that every practical exam I sit, I go in and come out more of a state than the past. This year I pledge to myself that I will be more prepared as I will start consolidating my notes and learning earlier and I will start revising that information earlier. Stay on top of my dissertation So here is the thing, basically once we have our dissertation and final essay in we can finish uni and enjoy the rest of our summer, and I did not really get a summer holiday...

As many of you know, I am a third year paramedic science student. It is now 2020 and whilst everyone on my social media feeds is seeming optimistic for the future, I feel quite the opposite. This is the year that I hope to graduate in. I say this quite negatively, but I guess that is honestly how I currently feel about my degree. I am not sure how I should feel about my degree, but I am aware that my boyfriend never had this level of anxiety and self-doubt during his studies and I am not sure this is how someone should feel during their degree, especially one which is vocational and will lead me directly to my future job. This may sound like I hate paramedicine - but actually it's far from it. I really enjoy being a (student) paramedic, the practice, learning and people, but its all the bits that you do not expect from your degree that I do not enjoy:  - The fear of getting a bad mark in an essay that accounts for 100% of a module or even worse, failing a module and having to ...

Regularly I get questions on Instagram regarding working and earning money whilst being at university, especially when it comes to working alongside placement. Here is how I have made and continue to make enough money to survive university. Student Finance If you are taking out a tuition fee loan then you may as well get a maintenance loan too. My lecturer described student loan repayments as a tax as you are unlikely to ever pay your student loan back fully, and you only repay a small percentage each month. I started my first year without a maintenance loan, and decided in roughly March that I could do with it. I applied for the last term and to my surprise, received the whole yearly amount in a one-off payment! Since then I have used my parents information to receive a means-tested loan, however I do not receive much unfortunately. My parents earn enough money that I receive very little maintenance loan, and as I am not supplemented by my parents and I do not live with them, I hav...

Here are some of the most frequently asked questions that I received in the academic year 2018/19. I am so lucky to have such an interested and enthusiastic Instagram follower base, so this is where these questions come from as it is the best way to get hold of me! If you have any questions, please always feel free to send me a message! What year are you in and where do you study? Originally I was going to keep this on the down-low, however as every university is different it is probably quite helpful to let you guys know. I study at Anglia Ruskin University and I am now in Year 3, although these questions were asked when I was in Year 2! How do your ambulance placements work? Do you get paid? With the university route, you do not get paid unless you do a sandwich (placement) year, and I am not sure if any universities do that anymore (I know University of Hertfordshire used to but does not anymore). As you may not have your blue-light driving qualification and you are not employ...

You want to go to university? Go you! I applied to five universities to study BSc Paramedic Science, undergoing English and maths selection tests, multiple mini interviews (MMIs), individual interviews and group interviews, and I received five offers. This is how I prepared, practised and performed. Choose Your Choices Wisely Check what the requirements for the course are. Be aware of what you will require to get onto the course. Not being the strongest at English or maths should not reduce your chance for getting in, but speak to the university as they will be able to advise how you can revise, or they may say that the test is not selective and purely so they can gauge what and how much support you may need. Before ruling out a choice as you think you may not get in, enquire further and see what the university can do for you, so you can do the best for them. Practice Makes Perfect Practice for the English and Maths tests using your school/college or university resources. G...

Week four of hospital placements was based in a Cardiothoracics centre for my intensive care sign off.  The Cardiothoracics centre is important to me to understand as if I have a patient with a stemi that meets required criteria, I would likely be bringing them to this centre as there are only two PPCI centres in my area. Background I was required to be on this placement for three days, for 13 hour shifts.The centre is for planned procedures and emergency cases, whilst also having a really large ward for patients varying in severity from 'ready to go home' to high dependency. I was based in the high dependency part of the ward with the opportunity to end up in different departments throughout the centre, such as the waiting rooms, operating theatres and intensive care. Day 1 With another long day ahead of me, I woke up at 5am, left the house at 5.30am and arrived just before 7am. I went in and found the nurse in charge who directed me to get changed, and then to the staff...