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Davis parked his ambulance and grabbed
one of the team’s trauma bags, ready to patch up
the injured man. His partner took along the team’s
airway
bag just in case. As Davis crouched down
to talk to the man, he called on his training to
make sure the patient was calm.
“You have to be able to communicate with
other people, you have to be able to talk to any-
one,” said Davis later. “You cannot be shy at all.”
The paramedic quickly saw that the man was
not seriously injured. Davis found only some minor
scratches and a bump on the man’s head. Davis
and Armentrout also made sure the man did not
hurt his neck. If they thought he had, they would
have had to bring out a special piece of gear to
keep his head from moving. However, when they
saw that his neck and spine were not hurt, they
moved on to other areas. As they looked, the man
told Davis that he had felt faint just before he fell.
“He was an older man, so we put him on a
cardiac
monitor, just to be sure he had not had
some sort of heart-related incident to cause his
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