He’s a Witch! Burn Him!

Caretic [noun; care-i-tik]*

Def: One who unapologetically defies dogma, conventional wisdom and poorly written protocols to provide quality patient care. Often confused with heretic, by the same people who unquestioningly propagate dogma, blindly accept conventional wisdom, and write stupid protocols.

The dictionary defines heretic as "a professed believer who maintains religious opinions contrary to those accepted by his or her church or rejects doctrines prescribed by that church."

There was a time when the same was said of Jesus Christ: "Say, what has gotten into that nice young, Nazarene carpenter? He used to be such a good boy, and now he's spouting crazy talk!"

Not that I put myself in the same category as Jesus Christ, but I'm a believer in EMS, and I believe firmly in the worth of what we do. I love this profession. 

Love it so much, in fact, that I'm willing to point out when we're full of shit. We've got a lot of doctrine in EMS that begs questioning.

Bryan Bledsoe, another EMS caretic, has been a good friend and a professional mentor for many years. And because of his willingness to state some unpleasant truths about our profession, some people in EMS hate his guts. I figure if I can piss off half as many of the same people, and for the same reasons, my career will have been a rousing success.

So yeah, I'm good with being a caretic.

*Word coined by Raquel "Rocky" Digati, a Facebook friend and reader. Here's hoping her word becomes part of the EMS lexicon.

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