Dubious Compliments, Inappropriate Conversations, and a Spurious ER Visit

[kpzra]

Permanent Fund Dividend...money for living in Alaska.

[wolfie]

In Alaska they take their PFD's to cover unpaid tickets/fines. If you are in jail when distribution time comes, it goes back to the state to cover the costs of housing you. It even tells us on the check stub how much went towards that that year. They go after the scofflaw folks too. I miss that state.

I must be missing something - Alaska distributes LIFE JACKETS (Personal Flotation Devices), and takes them back to cover unpaid fines? How would a cheque stub be involved in that?

[kpzra]

In Alaska they take their PFD's to cover unpaid tickets/fines. If you are in jail when distribution time comes, it goes back to the state to cover the costs of housing you. It even tells us on the check stub how much went towards that that year. They go after the scofflaw folks too. I miss that state.

[Geek King]

Maybe make the cost part of the fine to pay for drunk & disorderly, or public intoxication. Double or triple it to cover the folk who can't pay. Should help cover the costs. Make it coverable by property forfieture, excluding one home, one vehicle, ect.

[PepperElf]

drink them to the ER.

Sadly I have a feeling that wasn't a typo...

[Seshat]

Hospitals can't do it; heck, it's all we can do to get them to provide us with safe rooms for mentally ill patients, much less drunks.

Safe rooms for the mentally ill is really important.

Kpzra: I can see why Anchorage has sleep-it-off places. You'd end up with a lot of corpses come spring thaw otherwise. <shudder>

[kpzra]

I forgot that in Anchorage there are sleep off places. They are staffed with EMT's and are picked up by the Community Service Patrol Van so they don't tie up PD resources. They get info on the "guests" and pass it along so if anyone has warrants/listed as missing/wanted for anything then they are collected when PD gets a chance. They are always full and they have been trying to build more.

[BeeMused]

Maybe there needs to be a medically AND security supervised drunk tank?

We have one in Hamburg, each weekend it's full to the brim. I watched a report about it once, they have their frequent flyers, and sometimes they save a life.
The rooms are completely hoseable, so they aren't really comfortable, but it's a safe place to sleep it off.

[kpzra]

Not to mention most hospitals I know would have to expand to accommodate room it they were the new holding tank. As for safe rooms, out of the 3 hospitals in my hometown, only one has a dedicated "safe room" and even then only one. Another hospital has been known to just line the drunks up in the decon room.

[Sapphire Silk]

Maybe there needs to be a medically AND security supervised drunk tank?

I've advocated for it . . . to be in the jail. Unfortunately, there's no budget for it, and law enforcement doesn't want to budget for it.

Hospitals can't do it; heck, it's all we can do to get them to provide us with safe rooms for mentally ill patients, much less drunks.

[kpzra]

First cold snap of the season and people wold be calling about the drunks. There were some who were fine to stay outside but we had to wake them up and drink them to the ER. One night was 16 calls (in 12 hours), 11 of which were drunks.

[Rapscallion]

I was reading 'Things I learned from my Patients' - the infamous threads over on the SND forums recently. It's a very common ER complaint.

Rapscallion

[PepperElf]

A patient was roaming the ER talking loudly on a cell phone. The person on the other end was the patient's girlfriend. Everyone knew this because the two of them were having phone sex.

In the ER.

Perhaps someone needs to give him a clue-by-for.... that the emergency in his pants isn't the kind that the ER handles.



tho seriously, he couldn't have really needed the ER then. not if he was busy trying to get laid through his ears.

they were hungry.

in a way i'm not entirely surprised. kinda like how, in some areas, some people will purposefully get arrested right before the winter season ... just for the food & shelter.

[sms001]

Nah, it wasn't too bad. Just weird.

Even weirder is the little scenario that played through my head as I read it - that the patient didn't know about "hunger" and you folks diagnosed him:

"I don't know what's wrong with me! My stomach is making gurgling noises and feels hollow. I'm listless and faint and my mouth keeps watering!!"

"Get this person a sammich, STAT!"

[Seshat]

This issue is a double edged sword. It's actually safer to let drunks sleep it off in the ER than in the jail. A lot of people have died in jail because they aspirated vomit or had some other medical condition that wasn't adequately addressed by the jail staff.

A lot of my legal nurse consulting cases revolve around issues like this.

But it sure is a pain in the ass for the ER staff.

Maybe there needs to be a medically AND security supervised drunk tank?