Into the Breach: A Year of Life and Death with EMS Review

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(More customer reviews)After reading the other reviews felt I had to write my own.
First of all this is life in Newark EMS, she showed you the worst parts, and left out the BS. Obviously an attempt to impress the reader. The writer does not understand that without the BS jobs, the men and women who are professional urban EMS providers would have no down time, no time to get away from the horror that is at times their jobs. The jobs she wrote about all happened but she didn't right the mundane that one of the other reviews mentioned.
Irreverant humor happens in all of the human services, cops joke about the bodies in a crime scene, fireman are the ones who coined the term crispy critter, doctors and nurses laugh while coding a patient. Yes it does insulate them, that is why they do it. Once again Karam neglected to write about the times that the men and women of Newark EMS held the hand of the dying patient, or broke down in tears because too many people died that week, she really didn't show the whole image of the men and women.
Yes some of the people she choose to highlight maybe aren't the most stable or healthy, maybe they drink too much, but they are in the minority. Karam spoke of a man who worked nights, and on his days off he would spend time fishing with his kids. She made him out to be abnormal in the world of Urban EMS. Again this is Karam trying to glorify being unstable because of the job. Most of the men and women who work there have stable healthy home lives. They are able to come home and turn work off, and enjoy being with their kids.
Regarding the views of University ER nurses in the books, no the nurses in the er are not uncaring unfeeling bitches. Yes many of EMS providers feel that they are. If you didn't love what you do you would not work in the ER or in the streets of Newark.
To sum it up, Karam gave you a glimpse of the job, but not a full representation.

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Into the Breach is the true story of paramedics, emergency medical technicians, and heavy-rescue specialists fighting to control trauma and medical emergencies in one of America's toughest and most violent cities: Newark, New Jersey. A riveting account that hauls readers on a first-hand tour of street medicine today, Into the Breach shows what really happens inside an ambulance and some of the diverse and bizarre places EMS workers tread. Through authentic accounts, every facet of emergency care is on display-from the first 911 call to patient discharge or death, including an exclusive look at what is perhaps the biggest decontamination operation ever conducted, which crews performed for victims of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack.A hybrid profession that blends public safety and public health, EMS attracts careerists and volunteers from all sectors of society-from Boy Scouts and housewives to Fortune 500 vice presidents and work-fare recipients. The men and women that make up the Newark EMS graveyard shift, one of the busiest, full-time teams in the nation, are quintessential EMS workers: intense, irreverent, hard-working action junkies who crave autonomy and the instant gratification of solving critical problems in real time. This unflinching profile hones in on award-winning EMS workers as well as those who pollute the industry, ironically, sometimes one and the same.Into the Breach offers an unusual opportunity to bear witness to unimaginable suffering, heroic stoicism, and the inventiveness of American EMS workers fighting to save lives.

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