Chapter 4

To preserve evidence at a crime scene, which of the following actions will be most helpful?

Stay in the area where patient care is taking place.

While providing patient care at a secured crime scene, you should:

not cut through holes in clothing that might have been caused by bullets or stabbing.

In a state requiring EMTs to report child, elder, or domestic abuse, which of the following situations is the EMT required to report?

A child appears to have been burned on the arm deliberately.

Which of the following is TRUE about organ donation?

A donor must complete a legal document registering as an organ donor.

For which of the following situations would the EMT NOT be allowed to share protected health information about a patient?

A reporter pulls you aside to ask you questions about the people involved in a school bus accident.

Which of the following is NOT necessary to provide proof when attempting to prove negligence?

Malice

What is the term for placing a person in fear of bodily harm?

Assault

EMTs may be required to report all cases of the following:

Child, domestic, or elder abuse

A patient is suing an EMT for failing to administer oxygen for a heart attack. The patient is alleging that the EMT was negligent. This case would be considered a:

Civil case.

EMS is called to a cardiac arrest. The family states that the patient does NOT want resuscitative efforts to be made. To withhold resuscitation, which of the following valid documents would the EMS crew need to have supplied to them?

DNR order

Which of the following is a legal term that is used to describe an obligation to provide emergency care to a patient?

Duty to act

Which of the following would MOST likely be considered evidence at a crime scene?

Fingerprints

Laws that have been developed by states to minimize the risk of individuals being held liable for providing emergency care to victims of illness or injury are called:

Good Samaritan laws.

In a kindergarten, the teachers can give consent for EMT care of their students. Which form of consent applies here?

In loco parentis

Which of the following is TRUE about the scope of practice?

It is governed by many medical, legal, and ethical guidelines.

What is an EMT's primary ethical consideration?

Making patient care and the patient's well-being a priority

To which of the following situations would Good Samaritan laws generally apply?

Personnel responding to an emergency when off duty

When confronted with an issue regarding patient consent or restraining a patient, which of the following concepts should guide your decision making?

Provide for the patient's well-being.

What part of a door at a crime scene is likely evidence?

Pry marks

What is a set of regulations and ethical considerations that define the extent and limits of the EMT's job?

Scope of practice

Which of the following would MOST likely be considered evidence at a crime scene?

The condition of a patient's clothes

According to HIPAA, in which situation is the EMT allowed to share protected health information about a patient?

The information is required for billing purposes.

To which of the following persons would it be a breach of a patient's confidentiality for an EMT to divulge protected health information?

The patient's close friend

What may interfere with an EMT's ability to care for a patient at a crime scene?

The police want to interview the patient.

Which of the following would MOST likely be considered evidence at a crime scene?

The position in which the patient is found

Which of the following circumstances should be treated as a potential crime scene?

Unexplained death of a pediatric patient

Under which of the following circumstances would it be appropriate to share personally identifiable information about a patient's medical condition?

When giving a hand-off report to a nurse at the receiving hospital

An EMT called to the scene of a multiple-vehicle collision has:

a clear duty to act.

Expressed consent is involved in:

a situation in which an adult patient is conscious and alert.

If you stop providing care to a patient without ensuring that equivalent or better care will be provided, you could be legally liable for:

abandonment.

Wheeling a non-emergency patient into the hospital emergency department, placing him in a bed, and leaving without transferring care directly to ED staff constitutes:

abandonment.

Documents signed by a patient that communicate his or her wishes regarding medical care are called:

advance directives.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)

allows you to discuss patient-specific information only with individuals with whom it is medically necessary to do so.

Negligence is involved in:

an EMT leaving a patient unattended

A legal document allowing the health care provider to withhold resuscitation from a chronically or terminally ill patient is the known as:

an advance directive.

In the absence of a DNR order or physician's instructions, the EMT is obligated to:

begin full resuscitation immediately.

A critically injured patient dies in spite of the EMT's efforts according to the standard of care for that situation. This is a case of:

no negligence.

A 13-year-old patient involved in a collision who appears to be under the influence of drugs refuses care. Regarding the issue of providing care to this patient, you must consider this patient:

can't legally refuse care.

A standard of care defines the:

care expected of EMTs with similar training in a particular situation.

A Good Samaritan law will most likely protect you from a lawsuit involving:

care provided in good faith.

You arrive at a residence for a patient who is in cardiac arrest. The patient has a valid DNR but is also an organ donor. Some family members demand that you transport the patient for organ donation, and others demand that you not start CPR. You should:

contact medical direction.

You are ordered by police on the scene to transport a patient under physical restraints because that patient has been behaving violently and unpredictably. Your obligation is to:

continually monitor the patient's status once the patient is restrained.

You respond to the scene of an automobile accident where a patient has an obvious fractured femur. You ask your partner to get the traction splint from the ambulance. Your partner returns and tells you there is no traction splint in the ambulance. The EMTs could be guilty of:

negligence.

A legal document usually signed by the patient and his or her physician stating that the patient has a terminal illness and does not wish to prolong life through resuscitative efforts is a:

do not resuscitate order.

While on duty, you and your partner have just cleared the hospital and are on your way to finally take a lunch break when you see an accident scene. The scene appears safe, and you see two people standing outside of their cars. You elect to continue on to lunch without stopping. As on-duty EMTs, you could be held liable for violating the:

duty to act.

Guidelines that govern the practice of an EMT include:

ethical guidelines

You and your partner have arrived on the scene of a person injured as a result of a gunshot wound during a burglary. When police later arrive and secure the scene, one of the police tells you to file a complete report describing what you saw when you arrived on scene, as required by law in your area. You should:

file the report and leave out no details.

The concept of res ipsa loquitur would be MOST relevant to a situation involving:

harm to a patient in the care of EMTs.

An EMT is off duty and near a patient in a restaurant who appears to suffer a choking episode, but another person in the patient's group helps dislodge the obstruction so that the patient can begin breathing normally. The EMT provides no care to this patient. In most states, this EMT:

has no legal obligation to provide care.

A patient appears to have overdosed on heroin and is unconscious. Consent in this case is:

implied.

You are on the scene of a motor vehicle collision where a patient's car struck a utility pole. Witnesses reported to you that the patient was unconscious after the impact. However, the patient is now conscious, alert and oriented, and refusing care and transport. You should:

inform the patient of your concern and try to persuade her to go to the ED and receive treatment.

You proceed to treat a patient who has consented to care, but you have NOT explained the risks and benefits of what you are going to do. This is MOST likely a violation of:

informed consent.

An adult patient's consent may be obtained through expressed or implied consent, depending on the patient's:

level of consciousness.

A patient is injured but refuses to be transported by ambulance. He is competent to make decisions, and you have exhausted all avenues to convince him to be transported, so you have him sign a refusal of treatment form. This form is intended to release you from:

liability for not providing care.

If an EMT were to release information about how intoxicated a patient was onto a social networking site, this could be considered:

libel.

You document on your run sheet that your patient with altered mental status is "just another drunk." This would likely be considered:

libel.

You observe what appears to be elder abuse in a call to a nursing home. You have a clear:

moral obligation to report the abuse.

An EMT fails to properly care for a patient despite having a duty to act. The EMT is most likely guilty of:

negligence.

You arrive at the scene of cardiac arrest, and your defibrillator has a dead battery. As an EMT, you can be charged with:

negligence.

You have just arrived at the station to start your shift, and you notice that your partner is asleep in a chair. You proceed to check out your ambulance. Your partner comes in drinking a cup of coffee, and you notice that she has a strong alcohol smell on her breath. Your duty as an EMT is to:

notify dispatch that you are out of service and have your supervisor come to meet you.

Upon arrival, you discover a deceased patient who apparently committed suicide. You must first:

notify law enforcement.

You are called to an obviously deceased patient with a stab wound to the lower abdomen. You should:

notify law enforcement.

You are transporting a victim from a motor vehicle collision, and the patient's condition is deteriorating rapidly. From your experience, you do not think this patient will survive transport. You noticed on the patient's driver's license that the patient is an organ donor. You can help to facilitate the patient's wishes by:

notifying medical direction of the patient's organ donor status.

A patient fell from the roof of a house while doing repair work. The patient is alert and oriented and has no injuries. The patient wants to refuse transport. The EMT should:

perform an assessment, let the patient know the findings and recommendations, and try to persuade the patient to be transported because of the mechanism of the injury.

EMS is called to a scene where a patient with a terminal illness is experiencing an anaphylactic reaction to peanuts. The family presents the EMS crew with a valid DNR form. The EMS crew should:

provide full treatment to the patient as in any anaphylactic reaction because the DNR is for resuscitation wishes only.

A 42-year-old patient who is mentally competent has refused care but appears to be experiencing respiratory difficulty. He demands you get into your ambulance and go. You should:

remain on the scene and try to persuade the patient to consent to care.

When you care for a patient at a crime scene, you decide that moving the patient is necessary to provide care, even though that might result in disturbing important elements of the crime scene. You should:

remember everything you disturb with the move and let law enforcement know.

The actions and care that are legally allowed for the EMT are called the:

scope of practice.

Your patient has several stab wounds to his anterior torso. You must quickly remove his shirt to access the wounds. The holes in the patient's shirt:

should not be cut through.

A patient dies under the care of an EMT and criminal proceedings begin against the EMT. When determining that EMT's negligence, the jury will consider what another (blank) EMS provider would do in the same circumstances.

similarly trained and experienced

An ambulance company's employees state that its chief competitor is jumping calls to get all the Medicare money they can, doesn't provide good-quality care, and never disinfects the insides of ts ambulances. These statements, never written down, could be seen as:

slander.

Your partner is telling others that you have an untreated gambling addiction and are thousands of dollars in debt from your gambling losses. You don't have a gambling addiction and are not in serious debt. You could bring your partner up on charges of:

slander.

The care that would be expected to be provided to the same patient under the same circumstances by another EMT who had received the same training is called the:

standard of care.

You are off duty and on your way to the grocery store when you witness a car accident in front of the store entrance. You stop to render assistance and identify yourself as an EMT to the occupants of the vehicles. The patient in the first car denies the need for assistance, but the second driver is complaining of neck pain. She tells you that she thinks she will be okay but would like to get checked out. You are in a hurry, as you have an appointment and want to get your shopping done first. You should:

stay with the patient until someone with an equal or higher care level of training or certification assumes care.

You have been under a lot of family stress lately and you have not been sleeping well. When you got to work this morning, you realized that you had forgotten to place your badge on your uniform shirt. You tell your partner that you cannot seem to think clearly Your partner tells you that he is concerned about your well-being. After hearing this, you know that your duty as an EMT is to:

take off work until you can straighten out your family problem and make sure that you are mentally prepared to work.

An EMS provider's standard of care represents and defines:

the care that would be expected to be provided on the basis of training.

Even if the Good Samaritan laws in a particular state cover the actions of EMTs as rescuers, they can still be held liable and are NOT protected by these laws if:

their actions demonstrate gross negligence.

You are on the scene of a patient who has had a seizure. The patient is now postictal and confused. The patient's husband is on scene and states that the patient usually is confused after a seizure and she will eventually come around. He states that he does not want her to be transported, as they cannot afford another ED bill. You should:

treat and transport the patient to the ED.

If emergency care providers discover that a seriously injured patient is an organ donor, they should:

treat the patient the same as a nondonor.

A patient refuses care and transport. You can see that this patient is in serious need of care. You need to:

try to convince the patent to accept care and transport.

A living will:

usually pertains to situations occurring in a hospital.

An EMT's scope of practice would encompass:

what an EMT may do.

You have not breached a patient's confidentiality if:

you only share information specific to that patient when medically necessary.