雷切尔·惠特莫耶(Rachel Whitmoyer)把她作为紧急医疗技术员的工作带到了澳门威尼斯人网上赌场的哲学澳门威尼斯人网上赌场中.
As an emergency medical technician (EMT) since 2020, Rachel Whitmoyer ’24 has helped countless patients facing dire situations. But she also has dealt with less-extreme scenarios, including one man who demanded transport to the hospital via ambulance because of . . . hiccups.
That incident proved annoying and enlightening for Whitmoyer, a double major in physics and philosophy at the University of Rochester who hails from Lebanon, Pennsylvania.
“当你服务的地区缺乏急救人员，而政策又要求你把非紧急病人送到医院时，你很容易感到沮丧,” she says. “But even if a patient isn’t in need of immediate medical care, they may not have the background necessary to recognize that. They can be scared, confused, and stressed.”
这样的情况促使惠特莫耶将她的毕业论文用于探索急诊医生面临的生物医学伦理问题. “So much of health care emphasizes curing patients as a solitary goal,” she says. “But high-quality patient care cannot exist without realizing that a patient is a person, and not a problem to be solved.”
Ambulances and academia
Whitmoyer的论文集中在几点:院前和医院设置中分诊和资源分配的正义考虑, 紧急医疗服务发起的拒绝运输协议对个人和社区的好处, 以及为什么医院外的“不复苏”(DNR)命令往往不尊重患者在临终医疗保健决定中的自主权.
“我的目标是解决在过去几十年里，顽固的法律要求如何优先于针对患者的护理, and the potential solutions that would allow providers to maintain a balance of both,” Whitmoyer says.
她的澳门威尼斯人网上赌场包括综合以往澳门威尼斯人网上赌场的结果，并从伦理角度对其进行分析. “For instance, 我一直在利用澳门威尼斯人网上赌场来量化不必要的救护车使用，并澳门威尼斯人网上赌场讨论了在有DNR命令的患者中不必要的复苏尝试,” she says. “能够与特定学科的大学图书馆员联系，对开始澳门威尼斯人网上赌场过程非常有帮助, as well as what I learned in my introductory writing and philosophy courses.”
缺乏真正医疗需求的病例可能会消耗有限的资源，并损害急救医生处理真正紧急情况的能力.
Pennsylvania is one of 13 states that deem EMS an essential service eligible for state funding. No one can be denied a ride to the hospital in an ambulance—although not everyone needs it, hiccups or otherwise.
“人们认为，如果他们乘坐救护车到达急诊室，他们会排在队伍的前面,” Whitmoyer says. “That’s not true, unless they’re in a cardiac or high-acuity situation. Anyone not facing a life-threatening situation usually has to wait.”
From EMT to physics and philosophy—by way of the Rochester curriculum
William FitzPatrick, 澳门威尼斯人网上赌场知识与道德哲学吉迪恩·韦伯斯特伯班克教授和惠特莫耶的论文导师, 说她是“一个特别令人印象深刻、有抱负的学生”，有着出色的职业道德.
“Combining hard science, philosophy, and medicine is extraordinary, especially with the addition of a senior thesis project,” he adds.
菲茨帕特里克说，惠特莫耶的论文探讨了一些有趣而及时的问题，即如何在尊重病人对医院紧急运输的需求与对真正医疗需求的专业判断之间取得平衡.
“Current policy is weighted in favor of deferring to patient demands,” he says. “But in cases lacking genuine medical need this can stretch resources and compromise the ability of EMTs to attend to genuine emergencies; on the other hand, 在这种情况下，拒绝运输本身就会产生问题，除非潜在的社会挑战和脆弱性也得到解决.”
惠特莫耶在大二和大三时与菲茨帕特里克一起上课，并写了一篇关于在医疗紧急情况下获得知情同意的局限性的论文. 她非常喜欢做这项澳门威尼斯人网上赌场，并将其与她作为EMT的经历联系起来，因此她决定今年再进行一个项目，探索院前急救医学中的更多伦理问题.
惠特莫耶于2020年进入哈佛大学攻读物理专业，但在大二时又将哲学作为第二专业. 她说，罗彻斯特大学灵活的本科课程使学生可以主修两个不相关的领域. “进入我的第一学期，我可以选择课程，探索我的兴趣，这给了我很大的灵活性,” she says. “I took some philosophy courses and just fell in love with it.”
One of the early impactful classes was Philosophy 105: Reason and Argument, with associate professor Zeynep Soysal.
“那堂课教会了我，学会如何构建一个好的论点，不仅能让你更容易有效地表达你的想法，还能让你更容易分析来自其他来源的信息,” Whitmoyer says.
Answering the call
Whitmoyer took an EMT class in high school and became certified in June 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic was surging. 她在宾夕法尼亚州的两家公司工作——一家是有偿的，一家是志愿者的——在夏天，她每周可以工作60个小时. She usually works 12-hour shifts and always has at least one partner.
响应呼叫的第一步是确定患者的意识水平和召唤急救医生的原因. 惠特莫耶可能需要给病人输氧或用药，或实施挽救生命的干预措施，以控制与气道有关的高敏度问题, breathing, or circulation. emt通过无线电与医院的急诊科联系，提醒他们即将到来，并提供一份详细说明相关发现或实施干预措施的病人护理报告.
“我最喜欢的部分是为我的病人辩护，帮助他们在生命中最激动的时刻减轻压力,” she says. “对于我在现场遇到的许多人来说，我常常是一个陌生人，我认为得到他们的信任是一种巨大的荣誉和特权. Driving with lights and sirens on is pretty cool, too.”
Whitmoyer plans to pursue a career as an emergency medicine physician, which she will train for as she completes a military medical residency under the US Army’s Health Professions Scholarship Program after graduating medical school.
“My grandfather is an Army veteran, and many other family members have served,” she says.
Whitmoyer doesn’t rule out continuing as an EMT long term, either.
“I’d love to be able to pick up shifts if time allows,” she says. “The work is so rewarding.”
