EMT training career advice – Find the best EMT training for you

Before we discuss the EMT salary and whether the current compensation rate is fair for someone working in the emergency medical services industry, let’s discuss what an EMT is and his role in society.

An EMT or emergency medical technician is known by different names. Some call all EMT personnel paramedics because there is no observable distinction between a basic EMT and a senior paramedic on first glance. But there are distinctions when it comes to what kind of procedures EMTs can perform. A basic EMT will not be able to perform more complex procedures, but he can at least administer CPR and assess a patient’s condition on site or on the way to the nearest hospital’s emergency room.

All paramedics start as EMT Basic. Your role as a basic emergency medical technician, and eventually a paramedic, entails rescuing citizens who are in emergency medical situations. This role does not change no matter how far you rise in the ranks. Paramedics analyze the patient by checking his vital stats and decide on the next course of action.

The patient’s condition should be evaluated a few minutes after the EMT has looked at him. After caring for the patient the best they can, EMT Basics and the EMT Paramedic transport the person to the nearest hospital for further treatment. In some cases, the EMTs are charged with the task of persuading the patient or the family members to seek further medical help because EMTs can only do first aid and cannot administer full treatment.

Some people think that providing emergency care under extreme conditions with a precision worthy of a post as a surgeon in a big hospital means getting the best pay in the industry. But reality tells us that this is hardly true. Paramedics and the EMTs hoping to become paramedics get less than twenty dollars per hour. In fact, the hourly rate range is 10-15 dollars an hour, with the highest pay awarded to those in the highest ranks. But this rate could change depending on location. Bustling cities will often give higher pay to the EMTs in the area because of the potential for overtime work and the number of people who need emergency care on a daily basis.

The median annual salary for a paramedic in the United States is a little over thirty thousand dollars. A paramedic is bound to get more if he works the graveyard shift (from 10 pm to 6 am) and when he does overtime. Seniority also calls for better pay, with the people who have worked longer getting more pay than the EMTs who are new to the job.

Most EMTs claim that the pay is secondary to the gratification they feel when they save a life. This emotional gratification is perhaps the main reason why so many people still want to continue on as EMTs.

An emergency medical technician is someone who assists patients outside the hospital facility. In most cases, these patients are under great stress because of crisis situations. In other words, they are in need of immediate medical help and are in no position to get to the hospital on their own. Someone who wants a career in the field of emergency medical services has the guts, patience and precision equal to that of a senior medical officer. But the willingness to become a part of the world’s most able emergency personnel is just the first step. To make your dream of becoming an EMT come true, you should undergo intensive training.

Steps Getting Certified as an EMT

Step 1: Start Basic Training

You can start your EMT training as a high school graduate and progress from there. Getting certification as an EMT involves a series of training courses included in one EMT basic course. EMT training will require time inside the classroom, for the student to learn the basics. But more importantly, there will be plenty of opportunities to get hands-on training with certified EMTs who are already certified paramedics.

Step 2: Hands-On Experience

This aspect of your training will prepare you for extreme situations that you will have to handle once you’ve become a full pledged paramedic. Although some cases are less extreme than others, you should be prepared for where your job will take you every day. Being a provider of emergency medical services requires you to be calm and collected even when everything is in chaos. This is the kind of thing that is not learned inside the classroom.

Step 3: Complete Your Skill Sets

Before you go to take your NREMT test, you should already have the necessary certificates of training for different EMT skills. A training program should include courses that are geared toward learning and mastering these EMT skills, such as CPR, I.V. maintenance, glucometer reading and airway maintenance. Not all training programs are equal in terms of comprehensive coverage of the various EMT skills, but you can continue to learn advanced methods even after you’ve been working as a basic EMT for a while.

When you’ve completed your Basic training, you can now prepare for your NREMT examination to get your EMT Certificate. Most people who move on to the examination phase got their training from a state-approved training facility. If you took a course from an institution that is not accredited for its EMT course, then you will be required to get additional training from a state-certified institution.

The next step is advancement. Find a job as an EMT Basic in your state or city, after which you can apply to take the exam for advancement as an EMT Intermediate. This is a requirement to become a paramedic, which should be your ultimate goal. As a paramedic , you will be eligible for better pay and better job opportunities in the country and abroad.

If you want a medical job without going for medical school, you can start by being an emergency medical technician. An EMT or emergency medical technician is the person who responds to a 911 call. He can either work for a private hospital, a government-funded institution like a fire fighter installation, or for a non-profit medical organization.

The general assumption is that a person can become a paramedic instantly once he has gone through training as a basic emergency medical technician. A career as an EMT will require you to pass several licensing examinations, as well as undergo further training.

The very first step is graduating from high school. You can start preparing for the job as early as middle school and high school, if an EMT career is the one you really want. You can focus on topics like English, health and languages. There may be instances when knowing how to speak another language can be a plus in your career, especially in areas where many people belong to a big community of a particular ethnicity.

After high school graduation, you can immediately start your training in providing emergency medical services by enrolling in an EMT Basic program. The EMT basic training course can be completed in two years. By the end of this period, you will have learned the fundamentals of responding to an emergency and you will have understood the crucial role of paramedics in health care. The training center should be affiliated with a hospital or several hospitals so that you can have hands-on experience before you graduate.

Local hospitals and community colleges provide this emergency medical technician basic training. But like everything else, some training courses are more comprehensive than others. To pass the licensure exam for your state or country, you should always find out if there are better training courses in other areas. The faster you can work in the field, the better. But you should also be given classroom exercises that are intensive enough to pass the written examination.

After going through licensing stages, as well as getting enough units in college to earn an associates degree, you can improve your career by becoming an EMT-Intermediate and then an EMT-Paramedic. To reach the point where you can become the senior officer in an emergency responder team, you should have accumulated enough hours on the job and have undergone several stages of training.

One thing that you must understand is that you cannot stay as a basic EMT forever. Sooner or later, you will have to rise the ranks, especially because of the work demands. While working as an EMT Basic, you should be ready to train as an EMT Intermediate, which will require another round of reviews and refresher courses. Training for this advanced status can be from 30 to 250 hours. When you are an Intermediate EMT, you will have more responsibilities, like supplying intravenous fluids to patients and how to use complex airway devices.

Many doctors, nurses and other health professional have chosen a more prolific career as an emergency medical technician. They go for the training and make their way from the bottom rung as an EMT Basic. All the extra training means hard work for someone who can comfortably look for a career inside the hospital. Why? A career as an emergency medical technician is one of the most in demand jobs around. EMTs are at the forefront of the action.

When there is a crisis, EMTs are the first ones on the scene. Plus, the overtime pay can be excessive, especially in big city fire fighter facilities and hospitals. So few people can really handle the pressure and stay in this career for a long time. Everything we mentioned contributes to the appeal of the emergency medical services as a worthwhile endeavor to devote one’s life for.

So, how to start being an EMT? You must first choose a training course that is comprehensive enough to include everything that will come up in the certification exams.

There are some first aid courses around that charge for the same amount as a real EMT training course, but these will not help you pass the certification exam. Don’t just go for the cheapest course, or one that you can easily go to. Find out where the EMT Basics go to for refresher courses and for sure, you will find a basic course that will really teach you the ropes. Sometimes, this could mean travelling to another state to get the training you want even if you plan to take the certification exam in your own state. The point is that the training you will pay for and get should prepare you for the examination given by the National Registry of Emergency Medical Technicians.

When choosing a good EMT training program, you should look at the course content. Most programs list the contents of the course in a timetable, which will also indicate the length of a course. A training course that helps parents become better at handling neighborhood and household accidents is extremely different from a real EMT course that can teach you how to stabilize a patient for transport in under a minute.

A good program will enable you to work as a competent emergency medical responder as soon as you finish the training. This means you should be able to get the skills that the big hospitals require, like the ability to assess patients after a few minutes and report these observations to the emergency room staff.

Hands-on training is important because this is the kind of training that you need in order to get used to the job. The job requires you to think on your feet at a lighting fast pace. The only way you can get to this level is if you’re used to it. Trainees often accompany real EMTs as a part of their training, and this is very important for passing the exam.

When you proclaim that you want to pursue a career as an emergency medical technician (EMT), you’ll get varied reactions from other people. Some will look at you with admiration, but some others will probably call you crazy. EMTs are an elite breed of individuals that tirelessly attend to people who are in desperate need of medical help. They’re at the front of any medical facility, and are typically the ones that receive dispatches from 911 operators.

To start your career, you need to choose an EMT training course that covers everything that will come out in the examination. Those who graduate from an accredited course must then prepare for a written examination as well as a practical examination in order to become certified. After passing the exam, the individual will be a registered EMT Basic, which simply means he has the fundamental skills to start working as a part of the staff in hospitals or other facilities that provide emergency medical services.

Training is needed if you want a career as an EMT. Every country and state has a specific exam that you have to pass to be a qualified EMT. But the studies don’t stop there. After passing the initial examination, you need to renew your certification of license every other year. There is also a need to work as an EMT to qualify for advancement.

The most basic certification is for the lower ranks of the EMT. Once you have this certification, you can apply for a job in hospitals as well as fire fighter facilities. However, you may not be able to function as a full EMT, but as an assistant of a more experienced EMT with a higher rank. To advance in this career, you need to be working actively as an EMT, and you should be ready to study more on your free time. You should also continue your education and review for the next round of exams if you want career advancement.

Some people are content with being ranked as EMT Basic. This is the lowest rank, and you get basic pay. But others want better pay and more responsibilities on the job so they go for higher positions. Also, some facilities that offer the best pay in the industry may require EMT Basic personnel to undergo the exam to become full-pledged paramedics. This is because they don’t want less trained personnel to handle extreme emergency cases just in case one senior EMT with better training is on leave when the extreme emergency happened. Advancement is a career decision you should choose to take, if you are really passionate about your work as an EMT.

The next rung on the ladder is to become an EMT Intermediate. In order to advance, you should review the EMT Basic course, which is also a requirement to become an EMT Intermediate. This is the second to the last step to become a full-pledged paramedic.

When choosing the right EMT training you need to consider what career you would like also what sort of procedures you can do. Without the highest level EMT training (EMT – P) you are restricted on the procedures you can carry out.

There are various options when choosing the right EMT training for you. There are 4 types of EMT training:

• EMT B – Basic
• EMT 85 – Intermediate
• EMT 99 – Intermediate
• EMT P – Paramedic

EMT training depends on the rank you are training for. The higher the rank the longer your training will last, EMT Basic can be two weeks 8-12 hours a day for your qualification.

EMT Basic will restrict the procedures you are able to carry out. For example bleeding control can be done by EMT basic; however EMT Paramedics can carry out fluid resuscitation and pharmaceutical administration. So choosing the right EMT training is crucial depending on what career you choose.

Going through the EMT ranks the lists of procedures that can be carried out expand each EMT training rank. It can take up to two years for the person to complete the EMT paramedics training. So depending on the level of training the time varies greatly.

EMT 85 and 99 usually take around 200-400 hours training for you to complete the course. Once the EMT training has been completed you are able to carry out many more procedures depending on the EMT course you have taken. EMT 85 can carry out IV therapy and use multi-lumen airway devices. EMT 99 has had additional training time and is qualified for cardiac monitoring.

There are various places you can go to get EMT training such as colleges, university’s, technical schools and universities. Also every state has a EMS facility where you can get EMT training. There will also be time spent on the work scene to complete all the training modules which could be in an ambulance on duty.

It can be difficult to tell how motivated a person is. It’s even harder to tell how committed someone is to a career in the medical professions. According to the most recently available data, emergency medical trainers or EMT as they’re sometimes called, mostly work on a volunteer basis. According to the United States Labor Department about 80% of all EMTs working in the fire department work free of charge. In addition to that the state department of health says that around 70% of all EMT agencies higher on a volunteer basis. Before we go further let’s look at some more statistics:

The typical education of an EMT

While keeping in mind the above data, try to remember that the majority of EMTs volunteers will go through at least one month of EMT training before they are officially allowed to engage in life-saving practices. You should also take note that a lot of states require EMTs to go through at least a year of study. There are even many professional level courses that go for two years.

Working hours and pay of an EMT

Now you need to take into account that even with adequate EMT training, this is one of the lowest basic salaries in the country. It’s difficult to find the average wage of all the EMT workers in the country, but there are going to be making around 19,000 to 33,000 in a year. Only around 2% of EMTs will make $50,000 a year. If this doesn’t put the whole picture into perspective for you then take into consideration the abnormally long work hours that an EMT will put in. Typically an EMT who works in a fire department will work 50 hours per week. The hours can even be longer if you’re working in a hospital environment. At hospitals you can easily extend to 60 hours or more.

Is working as an EMT considered a duty or a hobby?

While it is true that the most basic EMT training does not require any kind of professional degree and it can be completed in as little as one month doesn’t mean that the people involved in it simply consider it a hobby. The data above will show you the people who undergo EMT training are wholly committed to help their community and part of their duty is to fill the vacancies in our health care system. The vast majority of EMT’s will volunteer for a fire department. No one in their right mind would choose to work in such a dangerous place if they don’t take their duty to save human life very seriously.

You should also keep in mind that EMT training is a necessity for medical professionals, police and firefighters. Each of these professions is highly respected. While it is understood that EMT training is required only for professions which are the first line of defense in a major disaster. That means that lives are at stake in these professions. That can be taken as even more proof that EMT training in every department is taken very seriously, these people are very committed to protecting our well-being.