Quote:
Originally Posted by Deacon211
Oh, forgot to ask...
As for flight planning, do you tend to keep a few canned routes on hand and check forecasts throughout your duty period to make filing easier?
Or are the possible destinations too numerous to really make that workable?
I've flown for several ambulance operations, turbojet, turboprop, and piston. While some flying has a route, it's unusual; most all medevac flying is short notice, and may cover a wide area.
There are two basic kinds of medical flights; administrative transports in which one is moving a patient between facilities or taking someone for treatment, and those of a more pressing nature. While I have had a few occasions when we had a contract for regular movements of patients between locations, most of the time it's been a no-notice or short-notice pop-up trip, same as a charter. There may be an area of regular airports serviced, but it's been very common for the ambulance flying I've done to have pop-up trips that go across the country, into foreign countries, between states, etc.
Regarding your question about loading patients, it runs the gamut. It depends on the operation. Some places, policy was that pilots did not do the loading (risk of injury to the pilot creates a big problem in the middle of a medical transport). Other places, the pilot did most everything. In most cases, a tray or ramp or sled was available made of aluminum that extended out of the aircraft and on which the patient and gurney or bed slid in or out. In many cases, onboard medical personnel and ground ambulance personnel did the heavy lifting or moving.
I always made a policy of not interesting myself in the patient. I didn't really care what the patient's condition was or the purpose of the flight; all decisions need to be made on safety of flight. I never followed up on patients to see how they faired. I isolated my decision making and limited any interest or personal attention to the needs of the flight.
Flight planning can be done on the way to the hangar, over the phone, or today via foreflight or other means. At one operation, I lived in company housing not too far from the airport. When a call came in, I dropped whatever I was doing and went straight to the airport. I had my briefing and filing by phone on the way there and while I was towing the airplane out of the hangar, and already had an engine turning before the nurses and medics showed up.
I've flown burn victims, car wreck victims, shooting victims, even a chainsaw accident victim. I've had to take courses of medication after flying with contagious patients. I've had to help clean out vomit and blood, and have been pulled into the ambulance when things turned south prior to loading and the medical crew ran out of hands. I've flown dead children, dying children, and had people code or stroke out on board. On one occasion I was sent without medical personnel, the passenger was in the right seat on a transport home, and had a heart attack while we were in a remote area. A lot of flights in the middle of the night, a fair amount of bad weather flights. I've transported hearts and bones and kidneys, and have taken medical crews to harvest organs and bodies. I've been sent to get tissue samples prior to an organ harvest, and once went to an ICU to collect the samples, and was confronted by the family of the victim...who was still on life support next to me.
Point is, there's a lot of variety to what you might expect. It depends on the operator, the area, the kind of flying. There are a number of shady ambulance operators that only take flights with patients that can pay (illegal). I worked for a company that took everyone, but all our competitors would find ways out of flights if the patient's insurance wasn't adequate, or if the patient was uninsured. We also got called a lot more, because hospitals and emergency rooms and clinics knew we'd come, no matter what. In my opinion, ethics matter.
Do some research before you take the job.